FLAGS register

FLAGS register

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The FLAGS register is the status register in Intel x86 microprocessors that contains the current state of the processor. This register is 16 bits wide. Its successors, the EFLAGS and RFLAGS registers, are 32 bits and 64 bits wide, respectively. The wider registers retain compatibility with their smaller predecessors.

Flags

Intel x86 FLAGS register[1]
Bit #	Abbreviation	Description	Category
FLAGS
0	CF	Carry flag	Status
1		Reserved
2	PF	Parity flag	Status
3		Reserved
4	AF	Adjust flag	Status
5		Reserved
6	ZF	Zero flag	Status
7	SF	Sign flag	Status
8	TF	Trap flag (single step)	Control
9	IF	Interrupt enable flag	Control
10	DF	Direction flag	Control
11	OF	Overflow flag	Status
12-13	IOPL	I/O privilege level (286+ only), always 1 on 8086 and 186	System
14	NT	Nested task flag (286+ only), always 1 on 8086 and 186	System
15		Reserved, always 1 on 8086 and 186, always 0 on later models
EFLAGS
16	RF	Resume flag (386+ only)	System
17	VM	Virtual 8086 mode flag (386+ only)	System
18	AC	Alignment check (486SX+ only)	System
19	VIF	Virtual interrupt flag (Pentium+)	System
20	VIP	Virtual interrupt pending (Pentium+)	System
21	ID	Able to use CPUID instruction (Pentium+)	System
22		Reserved
23		Reserved
24		Reserved
25		Reserved
26		Reserved
27		Reserved
28		Reserved
29		Reserved
30		Reserved
31		Reserved
RFLAGS
32-63		Reserved

Use

The POPF, POPFD, and POPFQ instructions read from the stack the first 16, 32, and 64 bits of the flags register, respectively. POPFD was introduced with the i386 architecture and POPFQ with the x64 architecture. In 64-bit mode, PUSHF/POPF and PUSHFQ/POPFQ are available but not PUSHFD/POPFD.^[2]

The following assembly code changes the direction flag (DF):

pushf ; Pushes the current flags onto the stack
pop ax ; Pop the flags from the stack into ax register
push ax ; Push them back onto the stack for storage
xor ax, 400h ; toggle the DF flag only, keep the rest of the flags
push ax ; Push again to add the new value to the stack
popf ; Pop the newly pushed into the FLAGS register
; ... Code here ...
popf ; Pop the old FLAGS back into place

In practical software, the cld and std instructions are used to clear and set the direction flag, respectively. Some instructions in assembly language use the FLAGS register. The conditional jump instructions use certain flags to compute. For example, jz uses the zero flag, jc uses the carry flag and jo uses the overflow flag. Other conditional instructions look at combinations of several flags.

Determination of processor type

Testing if certain bits in the FLAGS register are changeable allows determining what kind of processor is installed. For example, the alignment flag can only be changed on the 486 and above, so if it can be changed then the CPU is a 486 or higher. These methods of processor detection were made obsolete by the CPUID instruction, which was first included in the Intel Pentium.

See also

• Status register
• Flag byte
• Flag (computing)
• Program status word
• Control register
• CPU flag (x86)
• x86
• x86 assembly language
• x86 instruction listings

References

1. 
   

• Intel 64 and IA-32 Architectures Software Developer's Manual (PDF) 1. May 2012. pp. 3–21.
• 
  
  2. Intel 64 and IA-32 Architectures Software Developer’s Manual (PDF) 2B. May 2012. pp. 4–349,4–432.
  Categories:

  • Digital registers
  • X86 architecture