Patent · US Expired

Interfacing external thread prioritizing policy enforcing logic with customer modifiable register to processor internal scheduler

US7613904B2 · kind B2 · utility

10Cited by
66References
91Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateFeb 4, 2005
Grant dateNov 3, 2009
Priority date
Expiry dateAug 22, 2025

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG06F9/3888
  • WIPO fieldComputer technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A bifurcated instruction scheduler for dispatching instructions of multiple threads concurrently executing in a multithreading processor is provided. The scheduler includes a first portion within a reusable core that is not customizable by a customer, a second portion outside the core that is customizable, and an interface coupling the second portion to the core. The second portion implements a thread scheduling policy that may be customized to the customer's particular application. The first portion may be scheduling policy-agnostic and issues instructions of the threads each clock cycle to execution units based on the scheduling policy communicated by the second portion. The second portion communicates the scheduling policy via a priority for each of the threads. When the core commits an instruction for execution, the core communicates to the second portion which thread the committed instruction is in to enable the second portion to update the priorities in response thereto.

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