Polling and Interrupts: Understanding the Differences and Methods

POLLING AND INTERRUPTS
By Name
Course
Instructor
Institution
Location

 Interrupts
 An interrupt refers to a hardware mechanism which allows CPU to sense a device
which requires its attention.
 Immediately the CPU senses that there is an interrupting wave on the interrupt-
request line, CPU halts instantly the activity it was executing and immediately
responds to interrupt sent by device [1].
 The handler of interrupts immediately resolves the interrupt through servicing the

Types of interrupts  An interrupt refers to a signal to the processor showing a
device that needs instant attention
 There are two types of interrupt;
 Hardware for example pressing on the key found on the
keyboard which makes the keyboard send interrupts to the
microcontroller which in turn reads the information of the
pressed key
Software
A hardware interrupt refers to an electronic notifying indication sent to the CPU from an external device.
A software interrupt is produced either by a special condition or an unusual command in the instruction set that sources an
interrupt when it is executed by the processor.