Byte Rex's den

Byte Rex keeps odd hours. The den is lit by two CRT monitors, a lava lamp and a pink neon sign across the street, and the server rack never stops blinking. The department's calculators are pinned to the board, racked in the server and spread across the desk and the floor.

Digital logic is arithmetic in base two. Each extra bit doubles the number of values a word can hold and each extra address line doubles the memory a chip can reach; a Karnaugh map turns a truth table into a simpler gate circuit; and timing decides whether any of it works, because a flip-flop only captures a signal that has settled before the clock edge. The calculators here cover bit widths and parity, Karnaugh maps, minterms and Boolean functions, adders, gate delays, clock frequency, memory addressing and flip-flop timing margins.

The poster lists the powers of two up to 1024. Byte Rex knows them by heart; the poster is for visitors.

“Each extra address line doubles the memory a chip can reach.” — Byte Rex

In this office

• Bit Width & Parity: Minimum bits needed to represent a value, its population count, and parity
• Karnaugh Map Position Finder: Row and column position of a minterm on a 4-variable Karnaugh map
• Boolean Function Counter: How many truth table rows and possible functions exist for N boolean variables
• Minterm Decoder: Decode a minterm number into its 4 variable (A, B, C, D) values
• Logic Gate Propagation Delay: Total propagation delay through a combinational logic path and the clock frequency it implies
• Addressable Memory: How many locations an address bus width can address
• Half/Full Adder: Sum and carry-out for two bits plus an optional carry-in
• Clock Frequency & Duty Cycle: Clock frequency and high/low time from a clock period and duty cycle
• Flip-Flop Setup/Hold Margin: Setup and hold timing margin for a synchronous flip-flop-to-flip-flop path

Project guides

• Design a Synchronous Circuit's Timing: Work out your critical path delay, pick a clock period that respects it, then confirm the flip-flops on that path actually meet setup and hold.

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