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AssigneeChips and Technologies, Inc.
InventorsJames S. Blomgren, Jimmy Bracking, David Richter, Francis Spahn
Estimating the term…
The present invention provides a microprocessor with a special Operation Capture Facility (OCF) mechanism which enables "faulting" whenever there is (a) a memory access request to any one of a specified plurality of blocks of memory (b) a request to access any one of a plurality of specified I-O ports or (c) any one of a specified plurality of interrupts is activated. This OCF mechanism includes a plurality of special registers which store either (a) an I-O port address, (b) a memory address or (c) an interrupt number. Mask registers are provided which (1) mask bits in the special register, thereby providing the ability to fault on an entire block of I-O access requests or upon activation of any one of a block of interrupts and (2) indicate which type of interrupts should be faulted and to indicate whether I-O should be faulted on a byte, word or double word.
In a single chip integrated circuit microprocessor which executes instructions in sequence and which has a plurality of I-O ports, said ports being addressed by I-O instructions that include a port address, said microprocessor having a special operating mode, the improvement which comprises an operation capture facility that includes in combination:
In combination with a single chip integrated circuit microprocessor which has an instruction register, a memory address register, and a plurality of I-O ports, said ports being addressed by I-O instruction that places a port address in said memory address register,
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.