Cisco Technology, Inc.

Amdahl Corporation

Matt Noel

Eugene T Wang

John Sandoval

Linda Newell

A system and method for using a single shared buffer to service multiple destinations for a telecommunications switch is disclosed. Upon receiving a cell of data to be sent to a destination, an interface stores the cell in a shared buffer. The address of the cell in the buffer is stored in a queue array. The address of the buffer address in the queue array is stored in a head array and a tail array. A threshold register tracks the global threshold for the total number of cells in the shared buffer and a destination threshold for each destination. The buffer can broadcast a data cell to a single location or send the same cell to multiple locations.

Shared buffer switch interface

The invention provides a method and apparatus for logging all references to microstore addresses irrespective of the number of times that a same address is referenced and irrespective of the order in which addresses are referenced. It provides a log indicating simply whether each address of the microstore has or has not been referenced within a prescribed time period. There is no limit placed on the duration of the prescribed time period and thus logging can cover long-term events such as, the full execution of a single macro-instruction, the full execution of an assembly level routine or the execution of all micro-instructions resident in the microstore as they are subjected to all possible input parameters. A practical tool for global visualization of computer operations is therefore provided.

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Boulder Creek, CA, United States of America

Matt Noel