Tues, 29 Aug 2023, 20:18 Problems 8 and 9 on the problem set

My students,

Since I chose not to show you in class how to solve problems 8 and 9 on the first problem set, I am 
removing them from the problem set.  You do not have to even mention them on your solution sheet.  I 
realize that the textbook spells out pretty completely how to solve problems 8 and 9.  Nonetheless, I 
think it is unnecessary for you to be able to do that in ECE 306.  What is important about "float" to 
understand in ECE 306 is that there is a data type common to just about all ISAs which is very much like 
the "scientific notation" that you probably studied in high school chemistry.  It is a very different data 
type than 2's complement integers and serves a very different purpose in its use in most computers.  I 
told you in class that a Data Type is a representation of information such that there are instructions in 
the ISA that operate on that representation.  Most ISAs have instructions ADD, SUB, MUL, and DIV that 
operate on 2's complement integers and instructions FADD, FSUB, FMUL, and FDIV that operate on 
numbers represented as "float."  In ECE 306 the programs you write will operate on 2's complement 
integers.  Before you graduate, you will write programs that operate on values respresented in 
"float."  In ECE 306, I simply want you to be aware that although our programs operate on values 
represented in 2's complement, there are other data types for representing numbers, for example 
"float." 

Good luck with the rest of the problems in the problem set.

Yale Patt