Make Entry -- Become an Editor -- Most Popular: (10, 25, 50, 75, 100)

   Help

Von Neumann Architecture

The term von Neumann architecture is used in reference to a model of computer design that has only a single storage area used to contain both the set of instructions required for the performance of a transaction and the data required or produced by the transaction. The architecture takes its name from the Hungarian mathematician John von Neumann, a man whose 1945 paper entitled First Draft Report on the EDVAC is widely considered to be one of the pioneering documented accounts on the topic of the broad purpose stored-program computer (known as an EDVAC).

A computer that makes use of von Neumann architecture has five components: a control circuitry, an arithmetic-logic unit, an input/output device, a memory, and a bus that ensures a data path connecting these components.

Computers that use this type of architecture are often referred to as von Neumann machines, but this can be a source of confusion, since the term is also used to refer to self-reproducing machines, a concept that von Neumann devoted much time to during its very early stages and that he came to call universal constructors.

Web Resources On Von Neumann Architecture

Information About Von Neumann Architecture
Wikipedia: Von Neumann Architecture

Book Resources On Von Neumann Architecture

John Von Neumann: The Scientific Genius Who Pioneered the Modern Computer, Game Theory, Nuclear Deterrence, and Much More by Norman MacRae
John von Neumann and the Origins of Modern Computing by William Aspray

Site Maps: Most Recent | Clusters | Browse
New: Graduate Student Job Opportunity