Appeal 2007-1247
Application 10/222,014
A. INVENTION
The invention at issue involves a run-time optimization system. In the
prior art, run-time optimizations were guided using emulators and control
loops. During emulation, control loops designate blocks of code as hot code
based on a predetermined number of executions of the blocks of code in the
emulators. (Spec. 1). Traces derived from the blocks of code include
management of branch instructions. Optimized code is placed into a cache.
(Id. 2). However, emulation can be time-consuming and such systems have
often been complex and unreliable. (Id. 3).
In contrast, Appellants’ invention provides for a run-time optimization
system in which control loops are placed in hardware and translation or
optimization components are placed in firmware (Id. 4).
B. ILLUSTRATIVE CLAIMS
Claims 1 and 6, which further illustrate the invention, follow.
1. A system for optimizing a portion of a program during
run-time of the program, the system comprising:
a hardware portion for detecting which instructions of the
program are more frequently executed and maintaining a history of
targets chosen by branch instructions of the program;
a software portion for forming an optimized trace of
instructions from the most frequently executed instructions and using
the history in making branch predictions for branch instructions
encountered in forming the trace; and
a trace memory portion that stores the optimized trace.
2
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