COMP 311 (Fall 2025)

Tuesday / Thursday 2:00 - 3:15 in FedEx Global Center, RM 1015.

A working draft of the syllabus can be found here!

Office Hours

Instructor: Kaki Ryan

Mondays: 10-12pm in FB114

TA OH: in SN143

Mondays/Wednesdays: 11-2pm, 4-5pm

Tuesdays/Thursdays: 3:30-5pm

Friday: 1:30-3:30pm

Course Links

Assignments

Gradescope (Enrollment code is NGNGRV)

miniRISC-V Simulator

miniRISC-V Programming Reading

RISC-V Datapath Guide

Final Exam Review

Optional Textbooks:

• Computer Organization and Design RISC-V Edition: The Hardware Software Interface by David Patterson and John Hennessey. PDF
• The RISC-V Reader: An Open Architecture Atlas by David Patterson and Andrew Waterman. PDF

Course Schedule

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Week 1

Tuesday 8/19:

• FDOC!! :)
• Lecture 1: Welcome! Introduction
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 8/21:

• Lecture 2: 211 Review
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 2

Tuesday 8/26:

• FDOC!! :)
• Lecture 3: Intro to Digital Logic
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 8/27:

• Lecture 4: Transistors, Logic Gates
• Slides
• In-class Practice
• Written Assignment 1 Released. Due 9/4 11:59pm

Week 3

Tuesday 9/2:

• Lecture 5: Logic Gates, Intro to Boolean Algebra
• Slides
• In-class Practice
• Lab 1 Released. Due 9/11 11:59pm

Thursday 9/4:

• QUIZ 1
• Lecture 6: Digital Software Tutorial, Gate Minimization
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 4

Tuesday 9/9:

• Lecture 7: More Gate Minimization
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 9/11:

• Lecture 8: Karnaugh Maps
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 5

Tuesday 9/16:

• Lecture 9: Multiplexers
• Slides
• In-class Practice
• Written Assignment 1 Released. Due 9/22 11:59pm

Thursday 9/18:

• Lecture 10: Adder/Subtractor Circuits
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 6

Tuesday 9/23:

• QUIZ 2
• Lecture 11: Shifter/Comparator Circuits
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 9/25:

• Lecture 12: ALU
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 7

Tuesday 9/30:

• Lecture 13: ALU Review, Intro to Timing Analysis
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 10/2:

• Lecture 14: Quiz Review, Propagation Delay
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 8

Thursday 10/2:

• QUIZ 3
• No Lecture

Week 9

Tuesday 10/14:

• Lecture 15: Registers and Flip-Flops, More Timing Analysis
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 10

Tuesday 10/21:

• Lecture 16: Computer Performance
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 10/22:

• Quiz 4
• Lecture 17: Intro to Pipelining
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 11

Tuesday 10/28:

• Lecture 18: Pipelining, Intro to RISC-V
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 10/30:

• Lecture 19: RISC-V Assembly!
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 12

Tuesday 11/4:

• Lecture 20: Quiz Review, R-Type Instructions
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 10/30:

• QUIZ 5
• Lecture 21: I-Type Instructions
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 13

Tuesday 11/11:

• Lecture 22: Loads, Stores, Memory
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 11/13:

• Lecture 23: Jumping/Branching, Bringing it all together!
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 14

Tuesday 11/18:

• Lecture 24: Pipelining a CPU!
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Thursday 11/20:

• QUIZ 6
• Lecture 25: Some pipelining details + tracing
• Slides
• In-class Practice
• Recording

Week 15

Tuesday 11/25:

• Lecture 26: Pipeline Hazards + Hardware Solutions
• Slides
• In-class Practice

Week 16

Tuesday 12/2:

• Lecture 27: More Pipeline Hazards, Caching + The Memory Hierachy!
• Slides
• In-class Practice