Sample code by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Like everything else in programming, the only way to really understand this is to play with minimal examples.
What makes this a "hard" subject is that the minimal example is large because you need to make your own small OS.
Vinaya Pitaka by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
x86 Paging Tutorial by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
This tutorial explains the very basics of how paging works, with focus on x86, although most high level concepts will also apply to other instruction set architectures, e.g. ARM.
The goals are to:
  • demonstrate minimal concrete simplified paging examples that will be useful to those learning paging for the first time
  • explain the motivation behind paging
This tutorial was extracted and expanded from this Stack Overflow answer.
RISC-V by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
The leading no-royalties options as of 2020.
China has been a major RISC-V potential user in the late 2010s, since the country is trying to increase its semiconductor industry independence, especially given economic sanctions imposed by the USA.
E.g. a result of this, the RISC-V Foundation moved its legal headquarters to Switzerland in 2019 to try and overcome some of the sanctions.
@cirosantilli/_file/webpack/webpack/sass by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
This example shows how to use @cirosantilli/_file/webpack/webpack/sass.
To make things simple, it generates a completely separate dist/index.js and dist/main.css which are manually included from index.html, and does not do any type of injection (neither Js into HTML nor CSS in Js).
GHDL by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Examples under vhdl.
First install GHDL. On Ubuntu:
sudo apt install verilator
Tested on Verilator 1.0.0, Ubuntu 22.04.
Run all examples, which have assertions in them:
cd vhdl
./run
Files:
Verilator interactive example by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
The example under verilog/interactive showcases how to create a simple interactive visual Verilog example using Verilator and SDL.
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/cirosantilli/media/master/verilog-interactive.gif
You could e.g. expand such an example to create a simple (or complex) video game for example if you were insane enough. But please don't waste your time doing that, Ciro Santilli begs you.
Usage: install dependencies:
sudo apt install libsdl2-dev verilator
then run as either:
make run RUN=and2
make run RUN=move
Tested on Verilator 4.038, Ubuntu 22.04.
In those examples, the more interesting application specific logic is delegated to Verilog (e.g.: move game character on map), while boring timing and display matters can be handled by SDL and C++.
NCBI open reading frame tool by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
NCBI online tool to find and view all open reading frames in a given FASTA: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/orffinder/
Register transfer level by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Register transfer level is the abstraction level at which computer chips are mostly designed.
The only two truly relevant RTL languages as of 2020 are: Verilog and VHDL. Everything else compiles to those, because that's all that EDA vendors support.
Much like a C compiler abstracts away the CPU assembly to:
  • increase portability across ISAs
  • do optimizations that programmers can't feasibly do without going crazy
Compilers for RTL languages such as Verilog and VHDL abstract away the details of the specific semiconductor technology used for those exact same reasons.
The compilers essentially compile the RTL languages into a standard cell library.
Examples of companies that work at this level include:
Asianometry by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Very good channel to learn some basics of semiconductor device fabrication!
Focuses mostly on the semiconductor industry.
youtu.be/aL_kzMlqgt4?t=661 from Video "SMIC, Explained by Asianometry (2021)" from mentions he is of Chinese ascent, ancestors from Ningbo. Earlier in the same video he mentions he worked on some startups. He doesn't appear to speak perfect Mandarin Chinese anymore though based on pronounciation of Chinese names.
asianometry.substack.com/ gives an abbreviated name "Jon Y".
Video 1.
Reflecting on Asianometry in 2022 by Asianometry (2022)
Source. Mentions his insane work schedule: 4 hours research in the morning, then day job, then editing and uploading until midnight. Appears to be based in Taipei. Two videos a week. So even at the current 400k subs, he still can't make a living.
Acts of the Apostles by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
GDSII by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Figure 1.
3D rendering of a GDSII file.
Source.
Integrated circuit layout by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Web technology by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Old cheat on separate repo: web.
Now moving to either:
  • separate files under: web-cheat/ for the boring stuff
  • subsections under this section for the more exciting stuff!
Place and route by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Given a bunch of interlinked standard cell library elements from the logic synthesis step, actually decide where exactly they are going to go on 2D (stacked 2D) integrated circuit surface.
Sample output format of place and route would be GDSII.
Electronic design automation by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
A set of software programs that compile high level register transfer level languages such as Verilog into something that a fab can actually produce. One is reminded of a compiler toolchain but on a lower level.
The most important steps of that include:
MuJoCo by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Was a closed source project by "Roboti LLC", which was then acquired by DeepMind in October 2021 and open sourced March 2022: www.deepmind.com/blog/open-sourcing-mujoco
This library is quite cool. Feel very brutally lean and mean.
Semiconductor fabrication step by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
SMIC by Ciro Santilli 35 Updated +Created
Video 1.
SMIC, Explained by Asianometry (2021)
Source.
Pinned article: ourbigbook/introduction-to-the-ourbigbook-project
Welcome to the OurBigBook Project! Our goal is to create the perfect publishing platform for STEM subjects, and get university-level students to write the best free STEM tutorials ever.
Everyone is welcome to create an account and play with the site: ourbigbook.com/go/register. We belive that students themselves can write amazing tutorials, but teachers are welcome too. You can write about anything you want, it doesn't have to be STEM or even educational. Silly test content is very welcome and you won't be penalized in any way. Just keep it legal!
Video 1.
Intro to OurBigBook
. Source.
We have two killer features:
  1. topics: topics group articles by different users with the same title, e.g. here is the topic for the "Fundamental Theorem of Calculus" ourbigbook.com/go/topic/fundamental-theorem-of-calculus
    Articles of different users are sorted by upvote within each article page. This feature is a bit like:
    • a Wikipedia where each user can have their own version of each article
    • a Q&A website like Stack Overflow, where multiple people can give their views on a given topic, and the best ones are sorted by upvote. Except you don't need to wait for someone to ask first, and any topic goes, no matter how narrow or broad
    This feature makes it possible for readers to find better explanations of any topic created by other writers. And it allows writers to create an explanation in a place that readers might actually find it.
    Figure 1.
    Screenshot of the "Derivative" topic page
    . View it live at: ourbigbook.com/go/topic/derivative
    Video 2.
    OurBigBook Web topics demo
    . Source.
  2. local editing: you can store all your personal knowledge base content locally in a plaintext markup format that can be edited locally and published either:
    • to OurBigBook.com to get awesome multi-user features like topics and likes
    • as HTML files to a static website, which you can host yourself for free on many external providers like GitHub Pages, and remain in full control
    This way you can be sure that even if OurBigBook.com were to go down one day (which we have no plans to do as it is quite cheap to host!), your content will still be perfectly readable as a static site.
    Figure 5. . You can also edit articles on the Web editor without installing anything locally.
    Video 3.
    Edit locally and publish demo
    . Source. This shows editing OurBigBook Markup and publishing it using the Visual Studio Code extension.
    Video 4.
    OurBigBook Visual Studio Code extension editing and navigation demo
    . Source.
  3. https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ourbigbook/ourbigbook-media/master/feature/x/hilbert-space-arrow.png
  4. Infinitely deep tables of contents:
    Figure 6.
    Dynamic article tree with infinitely deep table of contents
    .
    Descendant pages can also show up as toplevel e.g.: ourbigbook.com/cirosantilli/chordate-subclade
All our software is open source and hosted at: github.com/ourbigbook/ourbigbook
Further documentation can be found at: docs.ourbigbook.com
Feel free to reach our to us for any help or suggestions: docs.ourbigbook.com/#contact