Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Computer-to-computer protocol implementing – Computer-to-computer data transfer regulating
Patent
1996-07-01
2000-10-31
Powell, Mark R.
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Computer-to-computer protocol implementing
Computer-to-computer data transfer regulating
709213, 709230, 709212, 711121, 711130, 711148, G06F 1208, G06F 1516
Patent
active
061416924
ABSTRACT:
A method and apparatus are provided which eliminate the need for an active traffic flow control protocol to manage request transaction flow between the nodes of a directory-based, scaleable, shared-memory, multi-processor computer system. This is accomplished by determining the maximum number of requests that any node can receive at any given time, providing an input buffer at each node which can store at least the maximum number of requests that any node can receive at any given time and transferring stored requests from the buffer as the node completes requests in process and is able to process additional incoming requests. As each node may have only a certain finite number of pending requests, this is the maximum number of requests that can be received by a node acting in slave capacity from any another node acting in requester capacity. In addition, each node may also issue requests that must be processed within that node. Therefore, the input buffer must be sized to accommodate not only external requests, but internal ones as well. Thus, the buffer must be able to store at least the maximum number of transaction requests that may be pending at any node, multiplied by the number of nodes present in the system.
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Hagersten Erik
Loewenstein Paul
Powell Mark R.
Rossi Jeffrey Allen
Sun Microsystems Inc.
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