International Business Machines Corporation

International Business Machines Corporporation

Susan Elizabeth Eisen

Dung Q Nguyen

Hung Qui Le

Steven J Battle

Kenneth Lundy Ward

Brian David Barrick

Christopher M Mueller

Cliff Kucharski

Joshua W Bowman

Salma Ayub

Glenn Owen Kincaid

Brandon R Goddard

Brian William Thompto

Deepak K Singh

James Allan Kahle

Christopher Michael Abernathy

Kurt Alan Feiste

Mary Douglass Brown

James Edward Phillips

David R Terry

Joe Lee

Benjamin W Stolt

Bryan J Lloyd

Albert James Van Norstrand, Jr

Dhivya Jeganathan

David S Walder

Khandker Nabil Adeeb

Balaram Sinharoy

David Allen Hrusecky

Christian Zoellin

Scott Barnett Swaney

Cathy May

Jose Angel Paredes

Robert J Blainey

David Scott Ray

Shih-Hsiung Stephen Tung

Nicholas R Orzol

Mehul N Patel

Jeffrey Richard Summers

Eula A Tolentino

Michael James Mack

Gaurav Mittal

Harold W Cain

Charles Brian Hall

A James Van Norstrand, Jr

Jamory Hawkins

Kent Li

Guy L Guthrie

Eric M Schwarz

Alper Buyuktosunoglu

Pradip Bose

Jing Zhang

Michael Stephen Floyd

David Arnold Luick

Hans Mikael Jacobson

David S Levitan

Richard James Eickemeyer

Bradly George Frey

Michael Joseph Genden

Brian Robert Mestan

Richard William Doing

James Wilson Bishop

Andreas Wagner

Tu-An T Nguyen

Kevin Neal Magill

Luke Murray

Thao T Doan

Eula Faye Abalos Tolentino

Bradley G Frey

A system, processor, programming product and/or method for assigning instructions to destination register file blocks, and/or routing instructions, includes: providing a processing pipeline having two or more execution units configured to process instructions; providing a register file having register file entries configured to hold data, where the register file is subdivided into a plurality of register blocks and each register block has two or more register file entries; calculating a utilization rate for one or more register blocks; and assigning and/or routing an instruction to write its results to a register block based upon the utilization rate for that register block. Preferably the execution unit is configured to write its results to a single specific destination (rename) register block.

Routing instruction results to a register block of a subdivided register file based on register block utilization rate

A method for restoring a mapper of a processor core includes saving first information in a staging latch. The first information represents a newly dispatched first instruction of the processor core and is saved in an entry latch of a save-and-restore buffer. In response to reception of a flush command of the processor core, the restoration of the mapper is begun with the first information from the staging latch without waiting for a comparison of a flush tag of the flush command with the entry latch of the save-and-restore buffer. A processor core configured to perform the method described above is also provided. A processor core is also provided that includes a dispatch, a mapper, a save-and-restore buffer that includes entry latches and is connected to the mapper via at least one pipeline, and a register disposed in the at least one pipeline.

Fast mapper restore for flush in processor

A first instruction for processing by a processor core is received. Whether the instruction is a larx is determined. Responsive to determining the instruction is a larx, whether a cacheline associated with the larx is locked is determined. Responsive to determining the cacheline associated with the larx is not locked, the cacheline associated with the larx is locked and a counter associated with a first thread of the processor core is started. The first thread is processing the first instruction.

Prioritization of threads in a simultaneous multithreading processor core

A computer system, processor, programming instructions and/or method of processing data that includes a main register file having a plurality of entries for storing data; an accumulator register file having a plurality of entries for storing data wherein multiple main register file entries are mapped to one accumulator register file entry in the at least one accumulator register file; a logical register mapper to track and map logical registers to main register file entries, and a history buffer. Processing wide data width instructions includes evicting and restoring information from a single primary entry in the logical register mapper through a single read or write port in the logical register mapper without evicting or restoring the remaining other multiple main register file entries mapped in the accumulator register.

Evicting and restoring information using a single port of a logical register mapper and history buffer in a microprocessor comprising multiple main register file entries mapped to one accumulator register file entry

A computer system, processor, and method for processing information is disclosed that includes reading out a plurality of entries in a history buffer prior to initiating a flush recovery process; initiating the flush recovery process; determining which of the history buffer entries read out of the history buffer should be recovered; and sending information associated with the history buffer entries to be recovered to one or more history buffer recovery ports. In one or more embodiments, the history buffer entries are continually read out in response to a processor and history buffer entries read out from the history buffer are directed to a specific history buffer recovery port associated with a mapper of a specific logical register.

Steering a history buffer entry to a specific recovery port during speculative flush recovery lookup in a processor

Method and apparatus for a completion mechanism for a microprocessor are provided by identifying entries in a section of an Instruction Completion Table (ICT) that are marked as ready to complete via corresponding Ready to Complete (RTC) status bits; determining a tail pointer indicating a start of the entries in the ICT that are ready for completion; determining a head pointer that indicates an end of the entries in the ICT that are ready for completion; completing instructions included in the entries between the tail pointer and the head pointer; and updating the tail pointer to a value of the head pointer for a subsequent instruction completion round.

Completion mechanism for a microprocessor instruction completion table

A computer system, processor, and method for processing information is disclosed that includes partitioning a logical register in the processor into a plurality of ranges of logical register entries based upon the logical register entry, assigning at least one recovery port of a history buffer to each range of logical register entries, initiating a flush recovery process for the processor, and directing history buffer entries to the assigned recovery port based upon the logical register entry associated with the history buffer entry.

Logical register recovery within a processor

A method of instruction dispatch routing comprises receiving an instruction for dispatch to one of a plurality of issue queues; determining a priority status of the instruction; selecting a rotation order based on the priority status, wherein a first rotation order is associated with priority instructions and a second rotation order, different from the first rotation order, is associated with non-priority instructions; selecting an issue queue of the plurality of issue queues based on the selected rotation order; and dispatching the instruction to the selected issue queue.

Instruction dispatch routing

In at least one embodiment, a processor includes architected and non-architected register files for buffering operands. The processor additionally includes an instruction fetch unit that fetches instructions to be executed and at least one execution unit. The at least one execution unit is configured to execute a first class of instructions that access operands in the architected register file and a second class of instructions that access operands in the non-architected register file. The processor also includes a mapper circuit that assigns physical registers to the instructions for buffering of operands. The processor additionally includes a dispatch circuit configured, based on detection of an instruction in one of the first and second classes of instructions for which correct operands do not reside in a respective one of the architected and non-architected register files, to automatically initiate transfer of operands between the architected and non-architected register files.

Processor providing intelligent management of values buffered in overlaid architected and non-architected register files

A simultaneous multithreading processor and related method of operating are disclosed. The method comprises dispatching portions of a first instruction to be executed by a respective plurality of execution units of the processor; receiving, at an instruction completion table of the processor, respective finish reports responsive to execution of the portions of the first instruction; determining, using the received finish reports, that all of the portions of the first instruction have been executed; and updating the instruction completion table to indicate that the first instruction is ready for completion.

Finish status reporting for a simultaneous multithreading processor using an instruction completion table

A system and process for managing thread execution includes providing two data register sets coupled to a processor and using, by the processor, the two register sets as first-level registers for thread execution. A portion of main memory or cache memory is assigned as second-level registers where the second-level registers serve as registers of at least one of the two data register sets for executing the threads. Data for the threads may be moved between the first-level registers and second-level registers for different modes of thread processing.

Thread transition management

A computer system, processor, and method for processing information is disclosed that includes at least one computer processor, a register file associated with the at least one processor, preferably a condition register that stores status information, the register file having multiple locations for storing data, multiple ports to write data to and read data from the register file. The system or processor includes an execution area, and the processor is configured to read from all the read ports in a first cycle, and to read from all the read ports in a second cycle. In an embodiment, the execution area includes a staging latch to store data from a first cycle read operation, and in an aspect the computer system is configured to combine the data stored in the staging latch during a first read cycle with the data read from the second cycle.

Fused overloaded register file read to enable 2-cycle move from condition register instruction in a microprocessor

A method, processor and/or system for processing data is disclosed that in an aspect includes providing a physical register file with one or more register file entries for storing data; identifying each physical register file entry with a row identifier to identify the entry row in the physical register file; enabling one or more columns within a target entry row of the physical register file; and revising data in the columns enabled within the target entry row of the physical register file. In an aspect, each physical register file entry is partitioned into a plurality of columns having a bit width and a column mask preferably is used to enable the one or more columns within the target row of the physical register file, and data is revised in only the columns enabled by the column mask.

System and handling of register data in processors

In an approach to dynamic redistribution of register files, whether a redistribution of register files is necessary is determined. Responsive to determining that the redistribution of register files is necessary, one or more register file transfers that have not yet completed are flushed. One or more register file write locations are allocated for each architected register based on a register free list. Source data is read from each architected register. The source data is written to the one or more register file write locations.

Redistribution of architected states for a processor register file

Recovering microprocessor logical register values by: partitioning a register mapper by logical register type; providing a plurality of recovery ports; assigning a logical register type to a recovery port; receiving a restore required instruction; and mapping SRB (save and restore buffer) values to the register mapper by logical register type.

Supporting speculative microprocessor instruction execution

Growing community of inventors

Round Rock, TX, United States of America

Susan Elizabeth Eisen