Basic computer architecture and organisation

Assessment item 2 Assignment 1 Value: 15% Due date: 01-Apr-2014 Return date: 25-Apr-2014 Submission method options Alternative submission method Task Total marks: 30 Answer the following questions:  1. Under the von Neumann architecture, a program and its data are both stored in memory. It is therefore possible for a program, thinking a memory location holds a piece of data when it actually holds a program instruction, to accidentally (or on purpose) modify itself. What implications does this present to you as a programmer? [5 marks]   2. What are the limitations of Moore’s Law? Why can’t this law hold forever? Explain [4 marks]   3. Given a (very) tiny computer that has a word size of 6 bits, what are the smallest negative numbers and the largest positive numbers that this computer can represent in each of the following representations? [3 marks] a. Signed magnitude b. Ones complement c. Twos complement   4. Convert the followings:  [a, b, c: 1 mark each;  d, e: 2 marks each. Total 7 marks] a.  AC1216 to binary b.  -10710 to 8-bit 2’s Complement c.  11001101012 to Hexadecimal d.  100111102 (8-bit 2’s complement representation) to decimal e. -1.510 to IEEE-754 single precision   5. Construct the XOR operator using only AND, OR and NOT gates. [5 marks]   6. Tyrone Shoelaces has invested a huge amount of money into the stock market and doesnt trust just anyone to give him buying and selling information. Before he will buy a certain stock, he must get input from three sources. His first source is Pain Webster, a famous stock broker. His second source is Meg A. Tyrone’s third source is Madame LaZora, world famous psychic. After several months of receiving advice from all three, he has come to the following conclusions: a. Buy if Pain and Meg both say yes and the psychic says no. b. Buy if the psychic says yes. c. Dont buy otherwise. Construct a truth table and find the minimized Boolean function to implement the logic telling Tyrone