Computer architecture

Computer Architecture is a branch of the Technical computer science that deals with the design of computers ( computers ), and especially with their organization, and their external and internal structure (which is also denoted by ' Computer Architecture ' ) were employed.

Definition

Gene Amdahl, Gerrit A. Blaauw and Frederick P. Brooks led in 1964 the concept Architecture to distinguish the properties common to all models of the IBM System/360 from their in technology, capacity and operating speed very different versions. This commonality should facilitate the exchange of computer parts and programs at changing requirements of customers.

So it was an abstraction similar to the mathematical concept of an algebraic structure. In her will, for example, the arithmetic sequence and by the rules for change of operands or the resolution of brackets so abstracted that it is applicable for various basic quantities and links, such as the natural numbers with the addition or quantities of the Association.

The word abstraction avoided the authors, by providing a definition attempted in a footnote by enumeration: "The term architecture is used here to describe the attributes of a system as seen by the programmer, ie the conceptual structure and functional behavior as distinct from the organization of the data flow and controls, the logical design and the physical implementation. "

Later authors such as Peter Stahlknecht and Ulrich Kamp rabbits have detailed this enumeration, adds and changes, but also the aspect of commonality and abstraction lost sight of. Thus, the term computer architecture forfeited its essential character and became the buzzword for any sophisticated designs.

Application

As an architect of a building defines the principles and objectives of a construction project as the basis for the plans of the Bauzeichners, just puts a computer architect, the computer architecture as a basis for the actual design specifications laid.

The term is used for different meanings:

• The design of the processor architecture of a computer and its instruction set and techniques, such as SIMD and MIMD parallelism.
• More general and broader hardware architecture such as cluster computing and NUMA architectures.
• A less formal meaning refers to the description of the conditions ( particularly speed and connection conditions ) or design implementations of the different components of a computer (such as memory, motherboard, electronic peripheral or, more generally, the CPU).