# US 11,030,144 B2 · Peripheral component interconnect (PCI) backplane connectivity system on chip (SoC)

> Agents: this data is available as JSON from the patentgrep API and MCP server — see https://patentgrep.com/llms.txt

- Number: US 11,030,144 B2
- Document ID: US11030144B2
- Status: Granted
- Kind: B2
- Application number: 16/221,364
- Filed: 2018-12-14
- Published: 2020-06-18
- Granted: 2021-06-08
- Earliest claimed: 2018-12-14
- Assignees: Texas Instruments Incorporated
- Applicants: Texas Instruments Incorporated
- Inventors: Jason A. T. Jones; Sriramakrishnan Govindarajan; Mihir Narendra Mody; Kishon Vijay Abraham Israel Vijayponraj; Bradley Douglas Cobb; Sanand Prasad; Gregory Raymond Shurtz; Martin Jeffrey Ambrose; Jayant Thakur
- Web page: https://patentgrep.com/patent/US11030144B2

## CPC

- G06F 13/404: {with address mapping}
- G06F 15/7807: {System on chip, i.e. computer system on a single chip; System in package, i.e. computer system on one or more chips in a single package}
- G06F 13/10: Program control for peripheral devices (G06F13/14 - G06F13/42 take precedence)
- G06F 15/7864: {on more than one IC chip}
- G06F 13/4295: {using an embedded synchronisation}
- G06F 2213/0026: PCI express
- G06F: ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING (computer systems based on specific computational models G06N)

## Abstract

An integrated circuit. The integrated circuit comprises an interconnect communication bus and a plurality of peripheral component interconnect (PCI) multi-function endpoints (MFN-EPs) coupled to the interconnect communication bus, each PCI MFN-EP comprising a multiplexing device, a first address translation unit (ATU), and at least one PCI function circuit, each PCI function circuit comprising another ATU and a plurality of base address registers (BARs).

## Claims

### Claim 1

An integrated circuit, comprising:
an interconnect communication bus; and
a peripheral component interconnect (PCI) multi-function endpoint (MFN-EP) coupled to the interconnect communication bus, the MFN-EP comprising:
a first address translation unit (ATU); and
a PCI function circuit, wherein the PCI function circuit comprises:
base address registers (BARs) comprising a selected BAR, wherein the selected BAR is associated with an address internal to the integrated circuit associated with the first ATU; and
a second ATU;
wherein the PCI function circuit is configured to:
receive a transaction associated with a PCI address;
determine that the PCI address is associated with the selected BAR; and
using the selected BAR and the second ATU, determine an address internal to the integrated circuit based on the PCI address.

### Claim 2 (depends on 1)

The integrated circuit of claim 1, further comprising a local PCI function circuit coupled to the interconnect communication bus.

### Claim 3 (depends on 2)

The integrated circuit of claim 2, wherein the local PCI function circuit is an accelerator processing function.

### Claim 4 (depends on 1)

The integrated circuit of claim 1, further comprising a processor coupled to the interconnect communication bus.

### Claim 5 (depends on 4)

The integrated circuit of claim 4, wherein the processor is configured to execute instructions that cause the processor to configure the first ATU and the second ATU by writing values to the first ATU and the second ATU.

### Claim 6 (depends on 1)

The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the PCI function circuit comprises BARs.

### Claim 7 (depends on 1)

The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the integrated circuit comprises 4 MFN-EPs.

### Claim 8 (depends on 1)

The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the first ATU comprises at least 16 translation registers.

### Claim 9 (depends on 1)

The integrated circuit of claim 1, wherein the MFN-EP is configured to communicate with an external PCI address space of at least 1 GB extent.

### Claim 10

A method comprising:
reading memory region configuration definitions, by a processor of a backplane integrated circuit (IC), wherein each memory region configuration definition identifies a size of a memory region, identifies an IC communicatively coupled to the backplane IC where the memory region is located, and identifies another IC communicatively coupled to the backplane IC allowed access to the memory region, wherein each IC is communicatively coupled to a different multi-function endpoint (MFN-EP) of the backplane IC;
for each IC allowed access to one of the memory regions, writing the size of the memory region by the processor in a base address register (BAR) of a peripheral component interconnect (PCI) function circuit of the MFN-EP coupled to the IC;
for each IC where a memory region is located, configuring a translation register of an output address translation unit (ATU) in the MFN-EP coupled to the IC by the processor with a local address local to the backplane IC and with an address managed by a PCI root complex (RC) of the IC; and
for each IC allowed access to one of the memory regions, configuring a translation register of an input ATU in the PCI function circuit of the MFN-EP coupled to the IC by the processor with a local address local to the backplane IC wherein the translation register of the input ATU is associated to the BAR of the PCI function circuit of the MFN-EP.

### Claim 11 (depends on 10)

The method of claim 10, further comprising
for each IC allowed access to a memory region, receiving a PCI address managed by a PCI RC of the IC by the MFN-EP coupled to the IC and configuring the PCI address into the BAR of the PCI function circuit of the MFN-EP coupled to the IC.

### Claim 12 (depends on 11)

The method of claim 11, comprising
receiving a PCI transaction by an MFN-EP designating a PCI function circuit of the MFN-EP and comprising a PCI address in a PCI address space managed by the PCI RC of the IC coupled to the MFN-EP, wherein the PCI function circuit is associated to an IC where a memory region is located to which the IC coupled to the MFN-EP is allowed access;
looking up a BAR of the PCI function circuit by the PCI function circuit based on the PCI address in the PCI transaction;
reading the translation register associated to the looked up BAR of the PCI function circuit by the PCI function circuit;
determining a local address based on the translation register and the PCI address in the PCI transaction by the PCI function circuit;
transmitting the PCI transaction by the PCI function circuit to the local address via an interconnect communication bus of the backplane IC;
routing the PCI transaction by the interconnect communication bus to the MFN-EP coupled to the IC where the memory region is located; and
transmitting the PCI transaction by the MFN-EP coupled to the IC where the memory region is located to the PCI RC of the IC where the memory region is located.

### Claim 13 (depends on 10)

The method of claim 10, wherein the backplane IC comprises 4 MFN-EPs.

### Claim 14

An integrated circuit, comprising:
an interconnect communication bus; and
a peripheral component interconnect (PCI) multi-function endpoint (MFN-EP) coupled to the interconnect communication bus, the PCI MFN-EP comprising:
a multiplexing device adapted to be coupled to a first system on a chip (SoC), the multiplexing device configured to direct a transaction from the first SoC to the PCI function circuit responsive to determining that the transaction is for a second SoC;
a first address translation unit (ATU); and
a PCI function circuit coupled to the multiplexing device, the PCI function circuit configured to model the second SoC, the PCI function circuit comprising:
a second ATU; and
base address registers (BARs).

### Claim 15 (depends on 14)

The integrated circuit of claim 14, further comprising a local function circuit coupled to the interconnect communication bus.

### Claim 16 (depends on 15)

The integrated circuit of claim 15, wherein the local function circuit is an accelerator processing function.

### Claim 17 (depends on 14)

The integrated circuit of claim 14, comprising a processor coupled to the interconnect communication bus.

### Claim 18 (depends on 17)

The integrated circuit of claim 17, wherein the processor is configured to execute instructions that cause the processor to configure the first ATU and the second ATU of the MFN-EP.

### Claim 19 (depends on 14)

The integrated circuit of claim 14, wherein the integrated circuit comprises 4 MFN-EPs.

### Claim 20 (depends on 14)

The integrated circuit of claim 14, wherein the MFN-EP comprises three PCI function circuits.