Method of improving SCSI operations by actively patching SCSI processor instructions
US5463743A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Dec 1, 1993 |
| Grant date | Oct 31, 1995 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Dec 1, 2013 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06F13/126
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
A method for improving SCSI controller operations by actively patching SCSI processor instructions. In a first case, tag values assigned to queues for tagged queue operation are a multiple of the SCSI processor jump instruction length. When reselected, the tag value is patched or overwritten as the least significant byte of the address of a jump instruction. The upper bytes point to the beginning of a jump table. Each entry in the jump table is a jump instruction to the sequence for a particular queue or thread. Thus simple entry is made to the desired thread without a conditional branch tree. In a second case, special SCSI operations are directly handled by the host device driver and the SCSI processor only performs conventional data transfers and similar operations. The device driver patches the message length of the SCSI processor code to an illegal value, so that an illegal instruction develops, prompting the host device driver to perform the operation at a register level. This approach allows removal of all special operation conditional branching from the SCSI processor, greatly speeding up operations.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.