Programming - Assembly Stack Datastructure

    Hello it's me again! Today, after a long time of not uploading Assembly, even though I said that some Examples will come from time to time, I present you with a Stack Implementation using a Dynamic Array that gets set in the start of the programm! Just to point it out this Code is not perfect and I also had issues in some parts and couldn't find the bug! This whole post is just a Demonstration so that you can see that we can even make more advanced codes in Assembly than the simple stuff I showed you in our little series! 

So, let's get into the Implementation!

    Before starting out I wanted to point out that this whole post is for more advanced viewers that have already seen all my Assembly Posts and also know how a Stack Datastructure works! The Code is far from perfect and is just implementing the C Code for Stacks using Arrays having the Array be dynamic and using a Switch Case menu. Seriously, you will anyway never ever need to write such a thing in Assembly. But, you will see that the Code is actually not quite difficult, but a lot longer and bigger than it would take us to make such a Datastructure in C.

Code:

We will first define all the output strings, like always

.data 
size: .asciiz "Give stack size: "
malloc: .asciiz "Memory allocated with bytesize of: "
input : .asciiz "Give a number: "
space: .asciiz " "
newline: .asciiz "\n"
menustring: .asciiz "Menu:\n1. Print Stack.\n2. Push element.\n3. Pop Element\n0. Exit.\n"
waspopped: .asciiz " was popped!"
stackisfull: .asciiz "Stack is full!"
stackisempty: .asciiz "Stack is empty!"
wrongchoice: .asciiz "Please give number from menu!\n"


    After that we define the main function as global, cause we will have functions for the print, pop and push behavior of the Stack. We will also initialize the top index to -4 and get the size for the stack, convert it to bytes and allocate dynamic memory.

.globl main
.text
main:

li $s4, -4 # initialize top index

# print message for getting size
li $v0, 4
la $a0, size
syscall

# get size input
li $v0, 5
syscall
move $s0, $v0

# change to bytes
mul $s0, $s0, 4
# s0 now contains the bytes

# allocate dynamic memory
li $v0, 9
move $a0, $s0
syscall
move $s1, $v0
# s1 now contains the address

# print message with bytes allocated
li $v0, 4
la $a0, malloc
syscall

li $v0, 1
move $a0, $s0
syscall

li $v0,4
la $a0,newline
syscall


    After the allocation we will print out our menu and call the specific functions with the specific parameters and return statements

# menu loop
menu:
li $v0,4
la $a0,menustring
syscall

# get input value
li $v0,5
syscall
move $s2,$v0

# cases
beq $s2,1,case1
beq $s2,2,case2
beq $s2,3,case3
beq $s2,0,endmenu

# wrong choice
li $v0,4
la $a0,wrongchoice
syscall
j menu

case1: # print stack

# call print function
move $a0, $s0 # size
move $a1, $s1 # address
jal print

li $v0,4
la $a0,newline
syscall
j menu

case2: # push element

# print message for getting input
li $v0, 4
la $a0, input
syscall

# get input value
li $v0,5
syscall

# call push function
move $a0, $s0 # size
move $a1, $s1 # address
move $a2, $v0 # value
jal push

li $v0,4
la $a0,newline
syscall
j menu

case3: # pop element

# call pop function
move $a0, $s0 # size
move $a1, $s1 # address
jal pop

bltz $v0, stackempty

# print popped value
move $a0, $v0
li $v0, 1
syscall

li $v0,4
la $a0,waspopped
syscall

li $v0,4
la $a0,newline
syscall

stackempty:

j menu

endmenu: # end program
 
li $v0,10
syscall


    Lastly let's now write the 3 functions needed! You hopefully see that we simply use the knowledge from Stacks and the Memory Management from Assembly. These things are pretty simple to implement and I also included some error checking mechanig so that we have no failures (actually that part doesn't work so well everytime, but it must be a problem from the Simulator, cause the Code seems pretty right)!

print:
# a0 contains size in bytes
# a1 contains address

li $t0,0 # loop counter
for:

# check loop condition
bge $t0, $s4, endfor # $s4 is top index

# load from array
addu $t2, $t0, $a1
lw $t3, ($t2)

# print integer
li $v0,1
move $a0,$t3
syscall

# print space
li $v0,4
la $a0,space
syscall

# increment loop counter
addi $t0,$t0,4

j for

endfor:

jr $ra

push:
# a0 contains size in bytes
# a1 contains address
# a2 contains value

# increment top
addi $s4, $s4, 4

# check if full
bge $s4, $a0, full # $s4 is top index

# store value
addu $t0, $s4, $a1
sw $a2, ($t0)

jr $ra

full:
# print message
li $v0,4
la $a0,stackisfull

jr $ra

pop:
# a0 contains size in bytes
# a1 contains address

# check if empty
bltz $s4, empty # $s4 is top index

# set return value
addu $t0, $s4, $a1
lw $v0, ($t0)

# decrease top
addi $s4, $s4, -4

jr $ra

empty:
# print message
li $v0,4
la $a0,stackisempty
li $v0, -1
jr $ra


A simple execution looks like that:


And this is actually it guys and girls! Hope you enjoyed it!

    This post was actually not planned for now, but I am not finished with the MST Algorithms for Graphs and also the FSM's from VHDL. So, this post is actually some kind of filler that I have for situations like that :)

Until next time...Bye!

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