Understanding Clocks

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I was just wondering if I was comprehending clocks in the correct way, so far this is what I understand.

So there is the clock generator which can either be a clock, a crystal oscillator, or a voltage-controlled crystal oscillator. That clock generator creates the clock signal or clock pulse (which I use interchangeably but I do understand that the pulse is the actual up and down whereas the signal is the transmission of energy carrying information). There are two pulses, one positive, one negative, and within each pulse there are two edges (also positive and negative). The measure of how long it takes for one positive or negative pulse to go back to another positive or negative pulse is known as the period (T). And the measure of how long it takes for one clock cycle to occur per second is known as the frequency (A clock cycle being one positive and one negative pulse occurring adjacently to each other) Now here's where I get confused. Are clock speed and frequency 2 different things? Because I have it here that the clock speed would be the number of pulses per second, but if it's the same as clock frequency, then my idea that it's the amount of cycles per second is wrong. Either that or clock speed is the same as period...

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architecturehardwareclock
Purely from units perspective speed of a body is m/s, whereas frequency is 1/sec (as you noted). These two are used interchangeably, but to my experience frequency is much more common in academia/ work. - Simply_me

2 Answers

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The frequency of a clock or other wave is the number of cycles per unit time. This is the same thing as "clock speed" or "clock rate".

The frequency is equal to the reciprocal of the period: f = 1/T.

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"Clock speed" is a non-engineering term which tends to be used interchangably with clock-frequency.

The "pulses per second" confusion comes from the fact that the pulse between a rising and falling edge is regarded as the "active pulse" (as many electronic circuits are only triggered into activity on the rising edge of the clock), so many people will refer to there being the same number of clock pulses per second as there are rising edges per second. Whereas by your definition, there are 2 pulses per cycle and hence 2 pulses per rising-edge. I can see your reasoning, but I've never heard any electronic engineers (including me) defining a pulse like that.