By David Tarnoff, July 6, 2007. The material in this book is presented in three stages. The first stage, Chapters 1 through 7, discusses the mathematical foundation and design tools that address the digital nature of computers. The discussion begins in Chapters 1, 2, and 3 where the reader is introduced to the differences between the physical world ( the real world is analog: Non-Digital Signals ) and the digital world ( Digital Signals ). These chapters show how the differences affect the way the computer represents and manipulates data: Unsigned Binary Counting, Binary Representation of Analog Values, Binary Coded Decimal or BCD, Gray Codes, Binary Addition, Binary Subtraction, Binary Complements, Floating Point Binary, Multiplication and Division by Powers of Two, Arithmetic Carry and Overflow events. Chapter 4 introduces digital logic and logic gates followed by Chapters 5, 6, and 7 where the tools of design ( Karnaugh Map ) are introduced. The introduction of logic operations and logic gates opens up the field of computer design. Topics ranging from the mathematical circuitry inside the processor to the creation and delivery of an Ethernet message will no longer remain abstract concepts. The second stage, Chapters 8 through 11, applies the fundamentals of the first seven chapters to standard digital designs such as binary adders and counters, checksums and cyclic redundancy checks, network addressing, storage devices, and state machines. The last stage, Chapters 12 through 17, presents the top-level view of the computer. It begins with the organization of addressable memory in Chapter 12. This is followed in Chapter 13 with a discussion of the memory hierarchy starting with the physical construction of hard drives and ending with the organization of cache memory and processor registers. Chapter 14 brings the reader through the concepts of serial protocols ending with descriptions of the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet, TCP, and IP protocols. Chapter 15 presents the theories of computer architecture while Chapters 16 and 17 use the Intel 80x86 family as a means of example.

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