Readings in Computer Architecture

Thanks to the continued exponential advances in semiconductor design and the demands of evolving and emerging application domains, the field of computer architecture has never been more dynamic. This, the first major book of computer architecture readings in over two decades, captures this dynamism and reveals Computer Architecture's rich history of practice. This is much more than a simple collection of papers. The editors have carefully selected the most influential primary sources in specific areas of inquiry that, taken together, present the critical issues of the entire discipline. These include issues in technology, implementation, economics, evaluation methods, instruction set design, instruction level parallelism, dataflow/multithreading, memory systems, input/output systems, single-instruction multiple data parallelism, and multiple-instruction multiple data parallelism. In addition, you'll find the editors' thoughtful, focused introductions to each area, providing the context and background necessary for understanding the significance and lasting impact of these papers. The primary sources and insightful commentary contained in this book provide foundational knowledge for computer architects as well as for those who design supporting system software and compilers. This is an excellent resource for practitioners, instructors, students, and researchers. * Includes more than 50 influential papers spanning four decades of computer architecture research and development * Selected, edited, and introduced by three eminent researchers and educators in the field. * Demonstrates the value of primary sources by showing how forgotten design ideas of the past are often rediscovered when new needs or constraints emerge. * Accompanied by an annually updated companion Web site with links and references to recently published papers, providing a forum for the editors to comment on how recent work continues or breaks with previous work in the field.