Loading software on a plurality of processors

US7415703B2 · kind B2 · utility

Assignee

• International Business Machines Corporation · US

Inventors

• Maximino Aguilar · Austin, US
• Alex Chow · Austin, US
• Michael Norman Day · Round Rock, US
• Michael Stan Gowen · Georgetown, US
• Mark Richard Nutter · Austin, US
• James Xenidis · Cedar Park, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Sep 25, 2003
• Grant date: Aug 19, 2008
• Expiry date: Mar 29, 2026

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06F9/44526
• WIPO field: Computer technology
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

A processing unit (PU) retrieves a file from system memory and loads it into its internal memory. The PU extracts a processor type from the file's header which identifies whether the file should execute on the PU or a synergistic processing unit (SPU). If an SPU should execute the file, the PU DMA's the file to the SPU for execution. In one embodiment, the file is a combined file which includes both PU and SPU code. In this embodiment, the PU identifies one or more section headers included in the file which indicates embedded SPU code within the combined file. In this embodiment, the PU extracts the SPU code from the combined file and DMA's the extracted code to an SPU for execution.