The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 07, 1999
Filed:
Nov. 18, 1997
Vineet Soni, Brighton, MA (US);
Andrew Ayers, Amherst, NH (US);
Hewlett-Packard Company, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Abstract
The procedure of the invention eliminates redundant conditional branch statements (CBSs) from a program, wherein the program includes (i) plural blocks of program statements, (ii) a definition statement (DEF) for each variable in the program that assigns a value to each variable, (iii) a defining point (DEFP) which is a first point in the program that a value is calculated, and (iv) plural CBSs. Each CBS transfers control to one of two target blocks of program statements, dependent upon an operation code and controlling variable that form a part of the test associated with the CBS. The procedure associates all DEFs which define a same value, with a DEFP for the same value and determines (i) a controlling variable upon which a test CBS is dependent, (ii) a DEF of the controlling variable of the test CBS and (iii) a DEFP for the DEF of the controlling variable. If a value first calculated at the DEFP found in (iii) is utilized by a CBS, the procedure finds which arm of the CBS reaches the test CBS; and then revises a block of program statements that include the test CBS, to eliminate at least a test required by the test CBS, and replace the conditional branch with an unconditional branch.