Four Bit CPU
Ever wonder how a CPU works? Do you want to learn the answers the hard way?
If so this is the repository for you.
The Goal
Build a "macroprocessor" turing machine that can execute an assembly language.
How hard could it be?
Inspirations
- Simple CPU, on which this project is heavily based. Thanks Mike
- Mega Processor, cemented the desire to stick to four bits. Also had great retrospectives that highlighted the strenghts of Mike Freeman's emphasis on "Clock Enable" circuitry
- All About Circuits wonderful text for explaining the fundamentals of electricity and electronics
Assumed Knowledge
It will be challenging to list all the assumed knowledge here. We've been fiddling with software for decades, but electronics not so much.
- Knowledge of some form of computer programming. Assembly would be nice but the concepts of a higher level language like Python or JavaScript are very transferrable
- Basic knowledge of electricity, think simple pipe analogy, but not much knowledge of semi-conductors
- Basic knowledge of discrete mathematics, think truth tables, but not necessarily how to do algebra with discrete math (although that helps)
License
- Any software written for this project is subject to GPLv3
- All documentation is subject to the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license terms