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x86 asm / ARM asm
The lowest-level human-writable code, one dialect for Intel-style CPUs and one for ARM chips.
Assembly language is a near-direct textual form of the actual instructions a CPU executes, and each architecture has its own. x86 asm targets Intel/AMD processors while ARM asm targets ARM processors like those in phones and Apple Silicon. They're listed as implementation languages because the lowest-level parts of an OS, like boot and context switching, must be written per-architecture.
See also
- x86_64The 64-bit version of the x86 CPU architecture used by modern PCs and servers.
- two-stage bootloaderA boot design where a tiny first program's only job is to load a bigger, smarter second program.