Patent GB-871477-A (GB)
Title: Improvements in or relating to electric digital computers
IPC: G06F7/544
Filed: 1958-03-14
Abstract: 871,477. Digital electric-calculating apparatus. PHILIPS ELECTRICAL INDUSTRIES Ltd. March 14, 1958 [March 16, 1957], No. 8268/58. Class 106 (1). In a parallel-operating electric digital computer for automatically performing the calculation x+y.z on numbers x, y, z in registers 1, 2, 3 respectively, including an arithmetic element 4 which produces the sum or difference of the numbers in registers 1 and 2 and transfers this result, under control of a " microcontrol" circuit, possibly shifted, to register 1 and possibly part of register 3, the microcontrol circuit receives information about M(# 2) digits of the number z at a time and selects "micro-instructions" accordingly. In the binary computer described, this enables the number of operations to be reduced in cases where the number z has a string of " 0's " or " 1's ". For the arrangement illustrated in Figs. 1 and 6, n = 3 and a right-shift of up to 3 digit places may be made in registers 1 and 3. The parallel outputs x o *, x 1 *, x 2 * of adder 4, Fig. 6, representing the sum of the number in registers 1 and 2, are transferred to corresponding stages of register 1 or are transferred with a shift of 2 or 3 places whereby part of the sum enters register 3, according to whether signal o, p or q is operative to open the appropriate gates through line 19, 20 or 21 respectively. For a shift, without addition, of 1, 2 or 3 places, signal u, v or w is operative on line 22, 23 or 24. A further signal i on line 25 causes the number y in z to be complemented or inverted. A micro-instruction (see right-hand side of Fig. 1) comprises a symbol "+" or "0" (addition or not) followed by xR (where x is the required number of places of right shift), a symbol i or n (inversion or not) and an-additional or carry digit "1" or "0." The operative micro-instruction is determined bv the 3 least significant digits z 0 , z 1  z 2  in register 3, the state s of register 2 ("+" signifies true number, and "-" signifies complement) and the previous additional digit e. Fig. 2 shows for every possible combination, the instruction selected and the corresponding gating signals (column c). The micro-control circuit (Fig. 7, not shown) corresponding to Fig. 2 comprises multi-input AND and OR gates, and a bistable circuit for storing the digit e. In the example illustrated in Fig. 1, where x = 3761, y = 2839, z = 3463, for the first calculation stroke I the conditions correspond to line 8, Fig. 2, thus selecting instruction O.OR.i.O which simply causes the number y to be inverted. During stroke II, instruction +.3R.i.1 is selected; thus addition occurs whereby y is subtracted from x, the result and the number z are shifted 3 places in registers 1 and 3, and the number y is restored to its true form. Owing to the additional digit 1, addition again occurs during stroke III together with a further 3-place shift. The arithmetic operations performed so far are thus equivalent to replacing 0111 by - 0001 + 1000. Similar operations occur during the succeeding strokes, the final result being registered in 1 and 3 in place of the numbers x, y as indicated. Various modifications are described, e.g. the complement 6f y may be stored in a separate register associated with a separate adder; or the arithmetic element may comprise both an adder and a subtractor so that complementing is unnecessary. Instruction tables are given (Figs. 3, 4 and 5, not shown) for n = 2, n = 4 and<SP> </SP>n = 5.