Assembly Language Tutorial Series¶

A structured, progressive guide to x86-64 Assembly using NASM syntax on Linux. Each module builds on the previous. Beginners should start at 01 and work forward.

Curriculum Roadmap¶

Beginner — Foundations¶

#	Topic	Key Concepts
01	Introduction	What is assembly, why learn it, history
02	Computer Architecture	CPU, memory, buses, fetch-decode-execute
03	Number Systems	Binary, hex, two's complement, endianness
04	Environment Setup	NASM, ld, GDB, project structure
05	Registers	General-purpose, flags, segment registers
06	Memory & Addressing	Sections, addressing modes, LEA vs MOV
07	Basic Instructions	MOV, arithmetic, first programs

Intermediate — Control & I/O¶

#	Topic	Key Concepts
08	Control Flow	CMP, JMP family, loops, conditions
09	Stack & Procedures	PUSH/POP, CALL/RET, stack frames
10	System Calls	Linux syscall ABI, read/write/exit
11	Bitwise Operations	AND, OR, XOR, shifts, rotates
12	Arrays & Strings	String instructions, REP prefix, buffers

Advanced — Low-Level Mastery¶

#	Topic	Key Concepts
13	Calling Conventions	System V AMD64 ABI, cdecl, interop with C
14	Floating Point & SIMD	x87 FPU, SSE, AVX, packed operations
15	Inline Assembly	GCC `asm`, constraints, mixing C and asm
16	Optimization	Instruction latency, throughput, branch prediction

Prerequisites¶

Basic understanding of any programming language (C is ideal)
A Linux environment (native, WSL2, or VM)
Curiosity about how computers actually work

Tools Used¶

nasm    — assembler (converts .asm → .o)
ld      — GNU linker (converts .o → ELF binary)
gdb     — debugger
objdump — disassembler / inspection tool
strace  — trace system calls

Quick Start¶

# Install tools (Ubuntu/Debian)
sudo apt install nasm binutils gdb

# Assemble and link
nasm -f elf64 hello.asm -o hello.o
ld hello.o -o hello
./hello

Architecture: x86-64 (64-bit) Syntax: Intel / NASM OS: Linux (syscall numbers differ on Windows/macOS)