All-to-all permutation of vector elements based on a permutation pattern encoded in mantissa and exponent bits in a floating-point simd architecture

Abstract

Mechanisms are provided for dynamic data driven alignment and data formatting in a floating point SIMD architecture. At least two operand inputs are input to a permute unit of a processor. Each operand input contains at least one floating point value upon which a permute operation is to be performed by the permute unit. A control vector input, having a plurality of floating point values that together constitute the control vector input, is input to the permute unit of the processor for controlling the permute operation of the permute unit. The permute unit performs a permute operation on the at least two operand inputs according to a permutation pattern specified by the plurality of floating point values that constitute the control vector input. Moreover, a result output of the permute operation is output from the permute unit to a result vector register of the processor.