Architecture of an Assembler: Data Structures in Assembler Design -> Instruction Table

The instruction table is the core reference structure that an assembler uses to map mnemonic representations of machine instructions to their correspo...

Architecture of an Assembler: Data Structures in Assembler Design -> Symbol Table

The symbol table is one of the core data structures in any assembler. It serves as a central repository for all named identifiers encountered during t...

Architecture of an Assembler: Lexical analysis and tokenizing

After preprocessing completes macro expansion, includes, and directive handling, the assembler proceeds to lexical analysis, also known as tokenizing....

Architecture of an Assembler: Code generation: converting tokens to binary

The code generation phase is the assembler’s core responsibility—translating the parsed instructions and directives into raw machine code. This in...

Architecture of an Assembler: Symbol resolution and backpatching

After code generation has constructed the initial binary stream, an assembler must resolve all symbolic references to their actual numeric addresses o...

Architecture of an Assembler: Syntax Analysis: Grammar and Parsing

Following the lexical analysis phase, the assembler enters the syntax analysis or parsing stage. This phase is responsible for interpreting the token ...

Architecture of an Assembler: Assembler Phases Explained

 - Preprocessing: Macro Expansion, Includes, Directives1. Overview of Preprocessing in an Assembler Preprocessing is the initial phase in the assembl...

x86-64 Machine Code Encoding: Little-endian Conversion Walkthroughs

The x86-64 architecture uses little-endian byte order for representing multi-byte values such as immediate constants, displacement fields, and memory ...

Drawing Graphics with CPU Only on Windows Using GAS Assembly (Intel Syntax)

  This example shows how to create a simple Windows application in pure x86 Intel syntax assembly, which: Creates a window Allocates a framebuffer in...

Graphics Programming Using the CPU Only (No GPU): A Complete Guide for Professionals on Linux and Windows

 Why Program Graphics Without a GPU? With the advancement of GPU technologies, some might wonder: why would anyone be interested in drawing graphics ...

x86-64 Machine Code Encoding: Real encoding examples with byte breakdowns

This section presents practical, real-world examples of x86-64 machine code instruction encodings with detailed byte-level breakdowns. Understanding h...

x86-64 Machine Code Encoding: Encoding Examples

 - MOV, ADD, JMP, CALL.Introduction This section provides concrete examples of machine code encoding for several fundamental x86-64 instructions: MOV...