“When you wish to produce a result by means of an instrument, do not allow yourself to complicate it.”

—Leonardo da Vinci

CHAPTER 4

MARIE: An Introduction to a Simple Computer

4.1   INTRODUCTION

Designing a computer nowadays is a job for a computer engineer with plenty of training. It is impossible in an introductory textbook such as this (and in an introductory course in computer organization and architecture) to present everything necessary to design and build a working computer such as those we can buy today. However, in this chapter, we first look at a very simple computer called MARIE: a Machine Architecture that is Really Intuitive and Easy. We then provide brief overviews of Intel and MIPs machines, two popular architectures reflecting ...

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