CST 305 SYSTEM SOFTWARE

MODULE 2

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CSE, AJCE
SYLLABUS

SIC/XE Programming
Basic Functions of Assembler
Assembler Output Format – Header, Text and End Records.
Assembler Data Structures
Two Pass Assembler Algorithm
Hand Assembly of SIC/XE Programs.

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SIC Programming Examples
• Sample data movement operations
• No memory-to-memory move instructions

Sample data movement operation for SIC

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SIC/XE Programming Examples

Sample data movement operation for SIC

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SIC Programming Examples
• Sample arithmetic operations
• (ALPHA+INCR-1) assign to BETA (Fig. 1.3)
• (GAMMA+INCR-1) assign to DELTA

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SIC/XE Programming Examples

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SIC/XE Programming Examples
String copy

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SIC/XE Programming Examples

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SIC Programming Examples

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SIC\XE Programming Examples

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Programs
• 1. Write a sequence of instructions for SIC to compute ALPHA equal to
the product of BETA and GAMMA.
LDA BETA
MUL GAMMA
STA ALPHA
:
:
ALPHA RESW 1
BETA RESW 1
GAMMA RESW 1

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Programs
• Write a sequence of instructions for SIC/XE to set ALPHA equal to 4 *
BETA-9
• Use immediate addressing for the constants.
LDA BETA
LDS #4
MULR S,A
SUB #9
STA ALPHA
:
:
ALPHA RESW 1
BETA RESW 1

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Programs
• Write SIC instructions to swap the values of ALPHA and BETA.
LDA ALPHA
STA GAMMA
LDA BETA
STA ALPHA
LDA GAMMA
STA BETA
:
ALPHA RESW 1
BETA RESW 1
GAMMARESW 1

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Programs
• Write a sequence of instructions for SIC to set ALPHA equal to the integer portion
of BETA ÷ GAMMA.
LDA BETA
DIV GAMMA
STA ALPHA
:
ALPHA RESW 1
BETA RESW 1
GAMMA RESW 1

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 Programs
• Write a sequence of instructions for SIC/XE to divide BETA by GAMMA, setting ALPHA
to the integer portion of the quotient and DELTA to the remainder. Use register-to-
register instructions to make the calculation as efficient as possible.
LDA BETA
LDS GAMMA
DIVR S, A
STA ALPHA
MULR S, A
LDS BETA
SUBR A, S
STS DELTA
:
ALPHA RESW 1
BETA RESW 1
GAMMA RESW 1
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DELTA RESW 1
Programs
• Write a sequence of instructions for SIC/XE to divide BETA by GAMMA, setting
ALPHA to the value of the quotient, rounded to the nearest integer. Use register-
to-register instructions to make the calculation as efficient as possible.
LDF BETA
DIVF GAMMA
FIX
STA ALPHA
:
ALPHA RESW 1
BETA RESW 1
GAMMA RESW 1

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Programs
• Write a sequence of instructions for SIC to clear a 20-byte string to all blanks.

LDX ZERO
LOOP LDCH BLANK
STCH STR1,X
TIX TWENTY
JLT LOOP
:
STR1 RESW 20
BLANK BYTE C‘ ‘
ZERO WORD 0
TWENTY WORD 20

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Assembler

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ASSEMBLER

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Basic Assembler functions
• Translating mnemonic operation codes to their machine language
equivalents
• Assigning machine addresses to symbolic labels used by the
programmers
• Build the machine instructions in the proper format
• Convert the data constants specified in the source pgm into their
internal machine representations(EOF BYTE C’EOF’- 454F46)
• Write the object program and the assembly listing

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Example of a SIC assembler language
program

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Address Calculation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Object code generation

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Assemblers
• All these functions except number 2 can be easily be accomplished by sequential
processing of the source program.
• Convert symbolic operands to their equivalent machine addresses (eg: ZERO to
5788)
• This cannot be achieved in the sequential processing of the source program, one line at a
time
• This poses a problem : Forward Reference
• Reference to a label that is defined later in the program
• If we attempt to translate the program line by line, we will unable to process this
statement because we do not know the address that will be assigned to ZERO

• Because of this, most assemblers make two passes over the source program
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Assemblers
Assemblers make two passes over the source program

• PASS 1: Scan the source program for label definitions and assign
addresses (such as the Loc column)

• PASS 2: Performs the actual translation

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Assembler output format
• Assembler must write the generated object code into some output devices. This
object program will later be loaded into memory for execution.
• The simple object program format contains 3 types of records: Header, Text and End.
• Header record contains the program name, starting address and length.

• Text records contain the translated (ie., machine code) instructions and data of the
program, together with an indication of the addresses where these are to be
loaded.

• End record marks the end of the object program and specifies the address in the
program where execution is to begin.

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• Header
Col. 1 H
Col. 2~7 Program name
Col. 8~13 Starting address (hex)
Col. 14-19 Length of object program in bytes (hex)

• Text
Col.1 T
Col.2~7 Starting address in this record (hex)
Col. 8~9 Length of object code in this record in bytes (hex)
Col. 10~69 Object code (69-10+1)/6=10 records

• End
Col.1 E
Col.2~7 Address of first executable instruction (hex)

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Exercise Qn
ASUMSTART 1000
FIRST LDX ZERO
LOOP LDS THREE
LDT THIRTY
LDA ARRAY1,X
ADD ARRAY2,X
STA RESULT,X
ADDR S,X
COMPR X,T
JLT LOOP
HLT

ZERO WORD 0
THREE WORD 3
THIRTY WORD 30
ARRAY1 RESW 10
ARRAY2 RESW 10
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RESULT RESW 10
• LDS-6C
• LDT-74
• ADDR-90
• COMPR-A0
• HLT- FF

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Exercise Qn
ASUMSTART 1000
1000 FIRST LDX ZERO 04101E
1003 LOOP LDS THREE 6C1021
1006 LDT THIRTY 741024
H^ASUM--^001000^00001B
1009 LDA ARRAY1,X 009027 T^001000^1B^ 04101E^ 6C1021^ 741024^ 009027^ 189045^
100C ADD ARRAY2,X 189045 0C9081^9041^A015^381003^FF
100F STA RESULT,X 0C9081 T^101E^09^000000^000003^00001E
1012 ADDR S,X 9041 E^001000
1015 COMPR X,T A015
1018 JLT LOOP 381003
101B HLT FF

101E ZERO WORD 0 000000

1021 THREE WORD 3 000003
1024 THIRTY WORD 30 00001E
9027 ARRAY1 RESW 10
9045 ARRAY2 RESW 10
9081 RESULT RESW 10 CSE, AJCE 52
Forward referencing
• Reference to a label that is defined later in the program

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Passes of Assembler
• Pass can be defined as the activity of scanning the assembly language
programming.

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Passes of Assembler
• Single pass Assembler: The assembler scans the entire source
program (assembly language program) once and convert into an
object code.

• Multi-pass Assembler: The translation of assembly language program

into object code requiring many passes.

• The breaking of the entire assembly process into passes makes design
simpler and enables better control over the subtasks and
intermediate operations.
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Functions of Two Passes of
Assembler
• PASS 1 (Define symbols)
• Assign addresses to all statements in the program
• Save the values (addresses) assigned to all labels for use in Pass 2
• Perform some processing of assembler directives.
• (This includes processing that affects address assignment, such as determining
the length of data areas defined by BYTE, RESW, etc.)

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Functions of Two Passes of
Assembler
• PASS 2 (Assemble instructions and generate object program)
• Assemble instructions (translating operation codes and looking up addresses)
• Generate data values defined by BYTE, WORD, etc.
• Perform processing of assembler directives not done during Pass 1
• Write the object program and assembly listing

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Two Pass SIC Assembler
• Read from input line
• LABEL, OPCODE, OPERAND

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Assembler Data Structures

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Assembler Data Structures (internal
tables required by the assembler)
• Simple Assembler uses two major internal data structures:
• Operation Code Table (OPTAB)
• Symbol Table (SYMTAB)
• Also need a variable Location Counter (LOCCTR)

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OPTAB
• OPTAB is used to look up mnemonic
operation codes and translate them to
machine language equivalents

• This must contain at least mnemonic

operation code and its machine language
equivalent
• In more complex assemblers, this table also
contains information about instruction
format and length.
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OPTAB
• During Pass 1 OPTAB is used to look up
and validate operation codes in the
source program

• In Pass 2, it is used to translate the

operation codes to machine language

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OPTAB
• In case of SIC/XE machine that has instruction of different length.

• We must search OPTAB in the first pass to find the instruction length
for incrementing LOCCTR.

• In second pass, the information from OPTAB tell us which instruction

format to use in assembling the instruction, and any peculiarities of
the object code instructions

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OPTAB
• OPTAB is usually organised as a hash table, with mnemonic operation
code as the key

• This information in OPTAB is predefined when the assembler itself is

written, rather than being loaded into the table at the execution time.

• This hash table organisation provides fast retrieval with a minimum of

searching
• OPTAB is static table – entries are not normally added to or deleted
from it.
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LOCCTR
• A variable that is used to help in the assignment of addresses, i.e.,
LOCCTR gives the address of the associated label.
• LOCCTR is initialized to be the beginning address specified in the
START statement.
• After each source statement is processed, the length of the
assembled instruction or data area to be generated is added to
LOCCTR
• Thus whenever we reach a label in the source program, the current
value of LOCCTR gives the address to be associated with that label

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SYMTAB
• SYMTAB is used to store values(address) assigned to labels

• SYMTAB includes the name and value(address) for each label in the
source program, together with flags to indicate error conditions(eg: a
symbol defined in two different places)

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SYMTAB

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SYMTAB
• During Pass 1 , the labels are entered into SYMTAB as they are encountered
in the source program, along with their assigned addresses (from LOCCTR).

• During Pass 2, symbols used as operands are looked up in SYMTAB to obtain

the addresses to be inserted in the assembled instructions

• SYMTAB is usually organised as hash table for efficiency in insertion and

retrieval.

• Entries are rarely deleted from this table

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Generate object program

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Choice of Addressing Mode
• Instructions that refer to memory are assembled normally using a PC
relative or Base relative.
• If the displacements required for PC relative and base relative
addressing are too large then the 4 byte extended format instruction
is used.
• Programmer must specify the extended format (4-byte) by using the
prefix +
• The main difference between SIC and SIC/XE programs is the use of
register to register instruction

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Program Counter Relative
• Calculate the displacement
• Displacement must be small enough to fit in a 12-bit field (-2048 to 2047)
• In SIC, Program Counter is advanced after each instruction is fetched and
before it is executed;
• PC contains address of the next instruction.
• 10 0000 FIRST STL RETADR
• RETADR is at address (0030)16
• After the SIC fetches this instruction, PC = (0003)16
• TA = PC + disp
• Disp = TA –PC = (0030)16 - (0003)16= (02D)16

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Program Counter Relative Object
Code Generation #1
• 10 0000 FIRST STL RETADR
• Opcode(6 bits) = (14)16 = (0001 0010)2
• nixbpe = 110010
• n=1 , i=1 indicates that neither indirect or immediate addressing
• p=1 indicate PC-relative addressing

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Program Counter Relative
• 40 0017 J CLOOP
• CLOOP is at address (0006)16
• After the SIC fetches this instruction, PC = (001A)16
• TA = PC + disp
• Disp = TA –PC = (0006)16 - (001A)16= (-14)16 = (FEC)16 2’s Complement

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Program Counter Relative Object
Code Generation #2
• 40 0017 J CLOOP
• Opcode(6 bits) = (3C)16 = (0011 1100)2
• nixbpe = 110010
• n=1 , i=1 indicates that neither indirect or immediate addressing
• p=1 indicate PC-relative addressing

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Base Relative

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Base Relative
• Opcode : 54 = 0101 0100
• nixbpe = 111100
• x=1 indexed addressing
• b=1 base relative addressing

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Immediate Addressing
• No memory reference is included
• If immediate mode is specified, the target address becomes the
operand
• 55 0020 LDA #3
• TA = (03)16
• Opcode : 00
• nixbpe = 010000
• i=1 indicates that immediate addressing

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Immediate Addressing
• 133 103C +LDT #4096
• TA = (1000)16
• Opcode : (74) 16 = (01110100 ) 2
• nixbpe = 010001
• i =1 Immediate addressing
• e = 1extended instruction format since 4096 is too large to fit into the 12-bit displacement

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• COMPR A,S
• Instru. 15 0006 CLOOP +JSUB RDREC 4B101036

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Immediate + PC Relative Addressing Mode
• Instruction: 12 0003 LDB #LENGTH 69202D
• 13 BASE LENGTH
• 15 0006 CLOOP +JSUB RDREC 4B101036
• : :
• 100 0033 LENGTH RESW 1

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Indirect + PC Relative Addressing Mode
• Instruction: 70 002A J @RETADR 3E2003
• 80 002D EOF BYTE C’EOF’ 454F46
• 95 0030 RETADR RESW 1

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Program relocation
• More than one program can share the memory and other resources
of the machine.
• Actual starting address of the program is not known beforehand.
• So it is desirable to load a program into the memory wherever there is
a space for it.
• In such cases actual starting address of the program is not known
until load time.

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• Several programs can be loaded and run at the same time
• Load programs into memory wherever there is enough space
• Not specifying a fixed address at assembly time

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Program relocation

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Program relocation

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• The assembler does not know the actual location where the program
will be loaded.
• However the assembler can identify for the loader those parts of the
object program that need modification.
• An object program that contain the information to perform this kind
of modification is called a relocatable program.

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Literals
• It is convenient for a programmer to write the value of a constant
operand as a part of the instructions that uses it.
• Such an operand is called literal because its value is stated literally in
the instruction.
• Literal is defined by the prefix ‘=‘.
• Literals are constant operands which are used as the part of the
instruction itself.

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• A literal is identified with the prefix =
001A ENDFIL LDA =C’EOF’ 032010
• Specifies a 3-byte operand whose value is the character string EOF.
1062 WLOOP TD =X’05’ E32011
• Specifies a 1-byte literal with the hexadecimal value 05
Advantage
• Literals avoids having to define the constant elsewhere in the program
and make up a label for it.

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The difference between literal and immediate
operand
• In Immediate addressing, the operand value is assembled as part of
the machine instruction, no memory reference.
• With a literal, the assembler generates the specified value of the
operand as a constant and stores it at some other memory location.
• The address of this generated constant is used as the TA for the
machine instruction, using PC-relative or base-relative addressing
with memory reference.

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Literal pools
• All of the literal operands used in the program are gathered together
into one or more literal pools.
• Normally literals are placed into a pool at the end of the program.

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• LTORG
• When the assembler encounters a LTORG statement, it creates a
literal pool that contains all of the literal operands used since the
previous LTORG (or the beginning of the program).
• This literal pool is placed in the object program at the location where
the LTORG directive was encountered.
• Note that, the literals placed in a pool by LTORG will not be repeated
in the pool at the end of the program.

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 • LTORG
• If we had not used the LTORG statement, the literal =C’EOF’ would be placed
in the pool at the end of the program.
• This means that the literal operand would be placed too far away from the
instruction referencing it to allow program counter relative addressing.

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LTORG Directive
• Literal pool is placed too far away from the instruction referring it
when LTORG ASSEMBLER DIRECTIVE IS NOT USED.
• Thus the need for LTORG arises when it is desirable to keep the literal
operand close to the instruction that uses it.

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Duplicate literal
• Duplicate Literals – same literal in more than one place in the program and
store only one copy of the specified data value
• Both instructions refer to the same address in the literal pool for their
operand.

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How is a literal handled by an
assembler?
• The basic data structure needed is a literal table (LITTAB).
• In LITTAB for each literal contains
• the literal name,
• the operand value and length
• the address assigned to the operand when it is placed in a literal pool.
• LITTAB is organised as hash table, using the literal name or value as
the key

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• In Pass 1, each literal operand is recognised
• The assembler searches LITTAB for the specified literal name (or value)
• If the literal is already present in the LITTAB: no action is required
• If the literal not present: the literal is added to LITTAB (leaving the address
• unassigned)
• When Pass 1 encounters a LTORG statement or the end of the program, the
assembler makes a scan of the literal table.
• At this time each literal currently, in the table is assigned an address
• As these addresses are assigned, the location counter is updated to reflect the
number of bytes occupied by each literal.

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• In Pass 2, the operand address for using in generating object code is
obtained by searching LITTAB for each literal operand is encountered.
• The data values specified by the literals in each literal pool are
inserted at the appropriate places in the object program exactly as if
these values had been generated by BYTE or WORD statements.
• If a literal value represents an address in the program (eg: location
counter value), the assembler must also generate the appropriate
Modification Record.

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Assembler Design Options
• One – pass Assembler
• Multi - pass Assembler

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• One-pass assemblers are used when
• it is necessary or desirable to avoid a second pass over the source program
• the external storage for the intermediate file between two passes is slow or is
inconvenient to use

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• Main problem: forward references to both data and instructions

• One simple way to eliminate this problem: require that all areas be
defined before they are referenced.
• It is possible, although inconvenient, to do so for data items.
• Forward jump to instruction items cannot be easily eliminated.

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Sample Program for a One-Pass
Assembler

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One-Pass Assemblers
• There are two main types of one pass assembler
• Produces object code directly in memory for immediate execution
• Produces the object program for later execution

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One-Pass Assemblers -Load-and-Go
Assembler
• Load-and-go assembler generates their object code in memory for
immediate execution.
• No object program is written out, no loader is needed.

• It is useful in a system with frequent program development and

testing
• The efficiency of the assembly process is an important consideration.

• Programs are re-assembled nearly every time they are run, efficiency
of the assembly process is an important consideration.

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Forward Reference in One-pass
Assembler
• Omits the operand address if the symbol has not yet been defined
• Enters this undefined symbol into SYMTAB and indicates that it is
undefined
• Adds the address of this operand address to a list of forward references
associated with the SYMTAB entry
• When the definition for the symbol is encountered, scans the reference list
and inserts the address.
• At the end of the program, reports the error if there are still SYMTAB
entries indicated undefined symbols.
• For Load-and-Go assembler
• Search SYMTAB for the symbol named in the END statement and jumps to this
location to begin execution if there is no error
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Sample Program for One-pass
Assembler

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Sample Program for One-pass
Assembler

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Object Code in Memory and
SYMTAB: One-pass Assembler

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Object Code in Memory and
SYMTAB: One-pass Assembler

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If One-Pass Assemblers Need to
Produce Object Codes
• If the operand contains an undefined symbol, use 0 as the address and
write the Text record to the object program.

• Forward references are entered into lists as in the load-and-go assembler.

• When the definition of a symbol is encountered, the assembler generates

another Text record with the correct operand address of each entry in the
reference list.

• When loaded, the incorrect address 0 will be updated by the latter Text
record containing the symbol definition.
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Object code generated by one - pass
assembler

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Textbook

System software: an
introduction to systems
programming, Leland L. Beck,
3rd Edition, Addison Wesley,
Longman Inc., 1997.

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