US 2019/0158428 A1 · WORK UNIT STACK DATA STRUCTURES IN MULTIPLE CORE PROCESSOR SYSTEM FOR STREAM DATA PROCESSING

Abstract

Techniques are described in which a device, such as a network device, compute node or storage device, is configured to utilize a work unit (WU) stack data structure in a multiple core processor system to help manage an event driven, run-to-completion programming model of an operating system executed by the multiple core processor system. The techniques may be particularly useful when processing streams of data at high rates. The WU stack may be viewed as a stack of continuation work units used to supplement a typical program stack as an efficient means of moving the program stack between cores. The work unit data structure itself is a building block in the WU stack to compose a processing pipeline and services execution. The WU stack structure carries state, memory, and other information in auxiliary variables.

Claims33

Dependent claims

A device comprising:

a plurality of processing cores, each of the cores configured to execute one or more of a plurality of software work unit handlers (WU handlers);
and
a memory configured to store a plurality of work units arranged as a work unit stack (WU stack), each of the work units associated with one or more network packets, and each work unit specifying a particular one of the WU handlers for processing the one or more network packets and a further specifying a particular one of the cores for executing the WU handler,
wherein at least one of the work units within the WU stack includes an identifier of a second work unit within the WU stack for further processing the network packets upon completion of the work unit.

1 more element

A device comprising:

a memory unit configured to store stream data;
a networking unit configured to manage input and output of the data between a network and the device;
a plurality of queues configured to hold work units, wherein each of the work units identifies a portion of the stream data and operations to be performed on the portion of the stream data;
and
a plurality of processing cores in communication with the memory unit, the networking unit, and the plurality of queues, wherein the plurality of processing cores are arranged in a processing pipelined having a plurality of stages and are configured to execute a plurality of work units (WU) arranged as a WU stack to perform stream processing tasks on the stream data units,
wherein a first one of the plurality of processing cores is configured, as a first one of the stages, to execute a first WU handler specified by a first WU of the WU stack to perform the operations on the portion of the data as identified in the first WU, and
wherein a second one of the plurality of processing cores is configured, as a second one of the stages, to execute a second WU handler specified by a second WU of the WU stack for a subsequent processing stage identified in the first WU.

4 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Work unit stack data structures in multiple core processor system for stream data processing

Life of this patent

Work unit stack data structures in multiple core processor system for stream data processing

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims33