Methods and systems for managing address list control blocks

A non-transitory, machine readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions for performing a method, comprising machine executable code which when executed by at least one machine, causes the machine to:

• receive a request for processing an address list control block (ALCB) by a hardware based, ALCB offload engine of an adapter coupled to a computing device, where the ALCB is for sending information by the adapter to a processor of the computing device;
• determine by the ALCB offload engine that the ALCB associated with the request is located at a cache of the ALCB offload engine that is managed by a cache controller of the ALCB offload engine;
• forward the ALCB to an address computation module of the ALCB offload engine that uses the ALCB to compute an address of a memory location of the computing device for transferring the information to the processor of the computing device, where the ALCB stores the address of the memory location in an address list;
• generate a direct memory access (DMA) request to retrieve the ALCB from an adapter memory location, when the ALCB is not located at the cache;
• and
• store the ALCB at the cache, after the ALCB is received in response to the DMA request;
• wherein the ALCB stored at the cache is used for ALCB processing by the ALCB offload engine for another request received after the ALCB is stored at the cache;
• and wherein the ALCB offload engine offloads ALCB processing from a receive direct memory access (RxDMA) module of the adapter that transfers the information to the processor of the computing device.

A device coupled to a computing device, comprising:

• processing logic for executing instructions out of a device memory and generating a request for processing an address list control block (ALCB) used for sending information to a processor of the computing device;
• and
• a hardware based ALCB offload engine having:
• a cache controller that is configured to receive the request for processing the ALCB;
• determine that the ALCB is located at a cache of the ALCB offload engine managed by the cache controller;
• forward the ALCB to an address computation module of the ALCB offload engine that uses the ALCB to compute an address of a memory location of the computing device, where the ALCB stores the address of the memory location in an address list;
• generate a direct memory access (DMA) request to retrieve the ALCB from the device memory, when the ALCB is not located at the cache;
• and
• store the ALCB at the cache, after the ALCB is received in response to the DMA request;
• wherein the ALCB stored at the cache is used for ALCB processing by the ALCB offload engine for another request received after the ALCB is stored at the cache;
• and wherein the ALCB offload engine offloads ALCB processing from a receive direct memory access (RxDMA) module of the adapter that transfers the information to the processor of the computing device.