Method and apparatus for dynamically monitoring memory page access frequency in a non-uniform memory access computer system
US6035378A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventor
Key dates
| Filing date | Dec 16, 1997 |
| Grant date | Mar 7, 2000 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Dec 16, 2017 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06F2212/2542
- WIPO fieldComputer technology
- WIPO sectorElectrical engineering
Abstract
A method, implemented in hardware, to successively obtain memory access locality information for a large number of contiguous sections of system memory (pages) for the purposes of optimizing memory and process assignments in a multiple-node NUMA architecture computer system including a distributed system memory. Page access monitoring logic is included within each processing node which contains a portion of shared system memory. This page access monitoring logic maintains a plurality of page access counters, each page access counter corresponding to a different memory page address within a specified address range within system memory. Whenever the processing node generates a transaction requiring access to a memory address within the specified address range, the page access monitoring logic increments a count value contained within the page access counter corresponding to the memory address to which access is sought. The specified address range is defined by an address value contained within a range counter. The range counter is initially loaded with a starting address value, defining a first group of page addresses to monitor. This address value is periodically incremented up to a…
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.