Intelligent context management

Intelligent context management for thread switching is achieved by determining that a register bank has not been used by a thread for a predetermined number of dispatches, and responsively disabling the register bank for use by that thread. A counter is incremented each time the thread is dispatched...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Author Swanberg, Randal C
Format Patent
LanguageEnglish
Published 16.10.2018
Subjects
CALCULATING
COMPUTING
COUNTING
ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING
PHYSICS
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:Intelligent context management for thread switching is achieved by determining that a register bank has not been used by a thread for a predetermined number of dispatches, and responsively disabling the register bank for use by that thread. A counter is incremented each time the thread is dispatched but the register bank goes unused. Usage or non-usage of the register bank is inferred by comparing a previous checksum for the register bank to a current checksum. If the previous and current checksums match, the system concludes that the register bank has not been used. If a thread attempts to access a disabled bank, the processor takes an interrupt, enables the bank, and resets the corresponding counter. For a system utilizing transactional memory, it is preferable to enable all of the register banks when thread processing begins to avoid aborted transactions from register banks disabled by lazy context management techniques.
Bibliography:Application Number: US201313781254