Obtaining And Releasing Hardware Threads Without Hypervisor Involvement
AssigneeInternational Business Machines Corporation
InventorsGiles Roger Frazier, Ronald P. Hall
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A first hardware thread executes a software program instruction, which instructs the first hardware thread to initiate a second hardware thread. As such, the first hardware thread identifies one or more register values accessible by the first hardware thread. Next, the first hardware thread copies the identified register values to one or more registers accessible by the second hardware thread. In turn, the second hardware thread accesses the copied register values included in the accessible registers and executes software code accordingly.
Claims25
A machine-implemented method comprising:
- identifying a request, at a first hardware thread included in a processor, to initiate a second hardware thread;
- identifying one or more register values included in one or more first registers accessed by the first hardware thread;
- copying the one or more register values to one or more second registers accessible by the second hardware thread;
- and
- executing software code on the second hardware thread, wherein the executing includes the second hardware thread accessing one or more of the copied register values located in the one or more second registers.
An information handling system comprising:
- one or more processors;
- a memory coupled to at least one of the processors;
- a set of instructions stored in the memory and executed by at least one of the processors in order to perform actions of:
- identifying a request, at a first hardware thread included in one of the processors, to initiate a second hardware thread;
- identifying one or more register values included in one or more first registers accessed by the first hardware thread;
- copying the one or more register values to one or more second registers accessible by the second hardware thread;
- and
- executing a portion of the set of instructions on the second hardware thread included in one of the processors, wherein the executing includes the second hardware thread accessing one or more of the copied register values located in the one or more second registers.
A processor comprising:
- a first hardware thread;
- one or more first registers accessible by the first hardware thread, the one or more first registers including one or more register values;
- a second hardware thread initiated by the first hardware thread;
- one or more second registers accessible by the second hardware thread;
- and
- wherein the first hardware thread copies the register values from the one or more first registers to the one or more second registers in response to initiating the second hardware thread, and wherein the second hardware thread accesses one or more of the copied register values included in the one or more second registers in response to executing software code.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.