Patent · US Expired

Methods and apparatus for reordering and renaming memory references in a multiprocessor computer system

US6349361B1 · kind B1 · utility

189Cited by
7References
25Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateMar 31, 2000
Grant dateFeb 19, 2002
Priority date
Expiry dateMar 31, 2020

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06F12/0815
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

There is provided a method for reordering and renaming memory references in a multiprocessor computer system having at least a first and a second processor. The first processor has a first private cache and a first buffer, and the second processor has a second private cache and a second buffer. The method includes the steps of, for each of a plurality of gated store requests received by the first processor to store a datum, exclusively acquiring a cache line that contains the datum by the first private cache, and storing the datum in the first buffer. Upon the first buffer receiving a load request from the first processor to load a particular datum, the particular datum is provided to the first processor from among the data stored in the first buffer based on an in-order sequence of load and store operations. Upon the first cache receiving a load request from the second cache for a given datum, an error condition is indicated and a current state of at least one of the processors is reset to an earlier state when the load request for the given datum corresponds to the data stored in the first buffer.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.