machine instruction (redirected from machine instructions)

machine instruction

An instruction in machine language. Its anatomy is a verb followed by one or more nouns:

     OP CODE    OPERANDS (one or more)
     (verb)     (nouns)

The op code is the operation to be performed (add, copy, etc.), while the operands are the data to be acted upon (add a to b). There are always machine instructions to INPUT and OUTPUT, to process data by CALCULATING, COMPARING and COPYING it, and to go to some other part of the program with a GOTO instruction. See hardware platforms and computer.

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machine instruction [mə′shēn in‚strək·shən]

(computer science)

A set of digits, binary bits, or characters that a computer can recognize and act upon, and that, when interpreted or decoded, indicates the action to be performed and which operand is to be involved in the action.