Princeton University
COS 217: Introduction to Programming Systems

Assignment 5: SPARC Assembler

Purpose

The purpose of this assignment is to help you understand the assembly process. You will learn how to solve various problems faced by an assembler, details of the SPARC assembly and machine languages, details of the ELF object file format, and how to manipulate complex data structures.

Background

A SPARC assembler is a macro processor specialized for translating SPARC assembly language programs into machine language programs. It makes two passes: the first determines all the symbol definitions; the second applies those definitions and the translation of symbolic text into binary instructions and data.

Your Task

Your task in this assignment is to use the C language to create your own version of a two-pass SPARC assembler. Specifically, you should create two major functions: pass1() and pass2(). You will be given an input() function that parses the assembly language source program and generates a linked list of instructions. Your pass1() function then walks this list to construct a symbol table. Your pass2() function uses the symbol table to re-walk the instruction list, this time producing object code and relocation information. You will also be given an output() function that tweaks the object code produced by pass2() to produce a standard ELF object file that can be executed.

Resources

Please read Assignment 5 Programming Reference Manual and Assignment 5 Testing Programs before you start. They can be of great help.

For complete official documents about SPARC assembler, please refer to

Submission

As always, submit your solution electronically on arizona using
% /u/cs217/bin/submit 5 files
where files include: Leave the provided source files intact, and do not submit them.

Grading

We will grade your work on correctness, efficiency and understandability. Correctness means that you pass Assignment 5 Testing Programs . Efficiency means that you use reasonable approach. Understandability means that your program is easy to follow.