Motorola Corporation

Christopher Bryant

Lawrence Joseph Merkel

Brian Keith Reynolds

An interbus buffer (18) coordinates data transfers between two different sized buses. The first bus (processor bus) allows data to be ordered according to either a big endian protocol or a 'munged' little endian mode. The second bus (local bus) allows data to be ordered according to either a big endian protocol or a true little endian mode but does not define a transaction size. The disclosed interbus buffer coordinates interbus data transfers in spite of the variety of different transaction sizes and operating modes.

Interbus buffer for use between a pseudo little endian bus and a true

An arbitration protocol comprises the steps of receiving a plurality of resource request signals (12), comparing the received plurality of resource request signals to a rotating pointer (14), and either granting the shared resource to the resource user specified by the rotating pointer (16) and incrementing the rotating pointer (18) or granting the shared resource to a resource user according to fixed priority protocol (20, 22, 24, 26 and 28). The rotating pointer specifies one of a plurality of resource users according to a predetermined order. The two steps of granting are responsive to the step of comparing.

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Austin, TX, United States of America

Christopher Bryant