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:
Nov. 16, 2010
Filed:
Jul. 20, 2008
Richard William Doing, Raleigh, NC (US);
Brett Olsson, Cary, NC (US);
Kenichi Tsuchiya, Cary, NC (US);
Richard William Doing, Raleigh, NC (US);
Brett Olsson, Cary, NC (US);
Kenichi Tsuchiya, Cary, NC (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A method and processor for reducing the fetch time of target instructions of a predicted taken branch instruction. Each entry in a buffer, referred to herein as a 'branch target buffer', may store an address of a branch instruction predicted taken and the instructions beginning at the target address of the branch instruction predicted taken. When an instruction is fetched from the instruction cache, a particular entry in the branch target buffer is indexed using particular bits of the fetched instruction. The address of the branch instruction in the indexed entry is compared with the address of the instruction fetched from the instruction cache. If there is a match, then the instructions beginning at the target address of that branch instruction are dispatched directly behind the branch instruction. In this manner, the fetch time of target instructions of a predicted taken branch instruction is reduced.