Descripción del curso From Nand to Tetris:

We present a new course that aims to demystify the integrated function of computer systems, using a hands-on approach. The course synthesizes many abstractions, algorithms, and data structures learned in CS courses, and makes them concrete by building a complete computer system from the ground up. As the semester progresses, we guide the students through a modular series of projects that gradually construct and unit-test a simple hardware platform and a modern software hierarchy, yielding a surprisingly powerful computer system.

The hardware projects are done in a simple hardware description language (HDL) and a hardware simulator supplied by us. The software projects (assembler, virtual machine, and a compiler for a simple object-based language) can be done in any language, using the API's and test programs supplied by us. We also build a mini-OS. The result is a simple computer, simulated on the student's PC. We start the course (and this talk) by demonstrating some interactive games running on this computer, e.g. Tetris and Pong.

Building a working computer from basic logic gates is a thrilling intellectual exercise. It demonstrates the supreme power of recursive ascent, and teaches the students that building computer systems is -- more than anything else -- a triumph of human reasoning.

We are able to squeeze all this into a single course since we deal with neither efficiency nor advanced features, leaving these subjects to other courses in the program. The resulting approach is completely self-contained, requiring only programming as a pre-requisite. The course is described in an MIT Press book, a TED talk, and a Coursera course.