Register renaming with a pool of physical registers

US6108771A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• International Business Machines Corporation · US

Inventors

• Ute Gaertner · Schenefeld, DE
• Klaus J. Getzlaff · Schenefeld, DE
• Erwin Pfeffer · Eppelheim, DE
• Hans-Werner Tast · Holzgerlingen, DE

Key dates

• Filing date: Jan 29, 1998
• Grant date: Aug 22, 2000
• Expiry date: Jan 29, 2018

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06F9/3858
• WIPO field: Computer technology
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

A system and method for register renaming and allocation in an out-of-order processing system which allows the use of a minimum number of physical registers is described. A link list allows concatenation of a physical register representing a certain instance of the corresponding logical register to the physical register representing the next instance of the same logical register. By adding and removing links in this link list, it is possible to manage the assignment of physical registers to logical registers dynamically. Both the physical registers representing speculative instances and the physical registers representing in-order instances are administrated together. This is done by means of an in-order list, which indicates the physical registers that actually represent the architected state of the machine.