Computer Instructions: Types of Operations
- I/O Operations vary greatly from one architecture to another. These have to do with getting data from an input device like the keyboard, sending data to an output device such as the display/screen, pausing the execution of a program when an I/O device has data to transfer to the program, etc.
- Special-Purpose Operations also vary greatly from one architecture to another and include actions like flag control, cache management, address calculation, and other instructions beyond those listed in the previous categories.
This isn't an exhaustive list of all the instruction types and examples that a computer might have: when exploring an ISA, you will discover plenty other instructions and variations thereof.
Make sure to check not only what kinds of instructions exist but also the way in which you can use them: how many operands (= arguments) they accept, and what they do with these arguments.
These notes by Miriam Briskman are licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0 and based on sources.