Digital Circuit Design for Computer Science Students An Introductory Textbook [Paperback]

The author is the leading programming language designer of our time and in this book, based on a course for 2nd-year students at, he closes the gap between hardware and software design. He encourages students to put the theory to work in exercises that include lab work culminating in the design of a simple yet complete computer. In short, a modern introduction to designing circuits using state-of-the-art technology and a concise, easy to master hardware description language (Lola).This book emerged from lecture notes of a course taught in the second year to students of Computer Science at the Federal Institute of Tech? nology, Zurich. The topic of hardware design plays a relatively minor role in Compu? ter Science curricula at many universities. Most courses concentrate on the various aspects of theory, software, and of information sys? tems. Students therefore obtain few opportunities to deal with con? crete engineering problems and physical devices. We consider this as rather unfortunate, particularly for technical universities. As a result, we observe a growing gap between interest in and understanding of design issues involving not only software but also hardware and inter? faces. This is regrettable at a time when new and advanced solutions to many problems are often crucially influenced by recent hardware de? velopments, at a time when the engineer needs to be competent in both software and hardware issues in order to fmd an optimally inte? grated, competitive solution. It turns out that the hesitation of many students in Computer Science to take an active interest in hardware - his or her daily tool! - does not only stem from a preference of clean , abstract concepts with a corre? sponding distaste for dealing with concrete components, construction techniques, and the dirty realities inflicted by nature, but also stems from the lack of a bridge between the two realms.1. Transistors and Gates.- 1.1. Gates with Bipolar Transistors.- 1.2. Gates with Field EfflĐ