orthogonal instruction set


orthogonal instruction set

(architecture)An instruction set where all (or most)instructions have the same format and all registers andaddressing modes can be used interchangeably - the choicesof op code, register, and addressing mode are mutuallyindependent (loosely speaking, the choices are"orthogonal"). This contrasts with some early Intelmicroprocessors where only certain registers could be usedby certain instructions.

Examples include the PDP-11, 680x0, ARM, VAX.