Flag registers are special-purpose registers in a CPU that store the status or

condition flags resulting from arithmetic, logic, and comparison operations. These
flags provide information about the outcome of these operations and influence
subsequent instruction execution. Flag registers are essential for controlling
program flow and making decisions based on the results of previous computations.

Common flags found in flag registers include:

Zero Flag (ZF): This flag is set if the result of an operation is zero. It is often
used to test for equality or to determine if a value is equal to zero.

Carry Flag (CF): The carry flag is set if an arithmetic operation generates a carry
out of the most significant bit or if a borrow is required for subtraction. It is
used for multi-precision arithmetic and to detect overflow.

Sign Flag (SF): The sign flag is set if the result of an operation is negative. It
indicates whether the most significant bit of the result is set, which determines
the sign of a number.

Overflow Flag (OF): The overflow flag is set if the result of a signed arithmetic
operation exceeds the range that can be represented by the data type. It indicates
that an arithmetic overflow has occurred.

Parity Flag (PF): The parity flag is set if the number of set bits in the result is
even, indicating even parity. It is used for error checking and detection in data
transmission.

Auxiliary Carry Flag (AF): The auxiliary carry flag is used for binary-coded
decimal (BCD) arithmetic. It is set if there is a carry out of bit 3 to bit 4
during addition or a borrow from bit 4 to bit 3 during subtraction.

Direction Flag (DF): The direction flag controls the direction of string
manipulation instructions. When set, string operations decrement the memory
addresses being accessed; when clear, they increment the addresses.

These flags are typically stored in a single register, known as the flag register
or status register. Instructions can manipulate these flags directly or perform
conditional branching based on their values. Flag registers play a crucial role in
program control flow, error detection, and data processing within a CPU.