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Physical/virtual memory question?

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  • 22-10-2009 10:22pm
    #1
    bSlick
    Closed Accounts Posts: 248 ✭✭


    When you reference memory addresses in an assembly language program or you view a program's executable in a debugger/disassembler the addresses you are using/viewing are virtual rather than physical. Is this correct?


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    #2
    ronivek
    Registered Users Posts: 1,916 ✭✭✭ronivek


    It depends entirely on a number of factors that are a little bit too complex to really go into so I'll just give you a straightforward answer;

    In general on any modern hardware/OS combination your programs will be using virtual addressing.


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    #3
    unknownlegend
    Registered Users Posts: 375 ✭✭unknownlegend


    bSlick wrote: »
    When you reference memory addresses in an assembly language program or you view a program's executable in a debugger/disassembler the addresses you are using/viewing are virtual rather than physical. Is this correct?

    This depends on the assembler language and the assembler compiler. Some languages will let you specify specific purpose built registers and locations in memory space but others have a layer of abstraction from the physical memory (barring say, registers) and use an addressing module to take care of this. I think you might be thinking of an 'absolute memory address' which is indeed physical and general storage which may be 'virtual' to the debugging environment. Check out 'http://www.osdata.com/topic/language/asm/address.htm' it might help you.

    Thanks.


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