jeremy@cs.adelaide.edu.au (Jeremy Webber) (11/14/90)
Something I've found problematic with current Transputers is the idea of "fast on-chip RAM", not the RAM itself, but making optimal use of it on a system with maybe 2M or 4M of code and data. Relying on the programmer to work out which functions/data to place there is a lot of work, and never likely to be as optimal as implementing the RAM as an on-chip cache, handled by hardware, instead. It struck me that one way a compiler could make better use of the on-chip RAM would be to treat the first few words like registers, and use standard register-allocation techniques to put expression temps and currently-accessed variables into it. By allocating different addresses for each process, context switch overhead could be eliminated when using this technique. Are there any compilers (particularly for C) which do this? Does anyone else have thoughts as to what to do with the RAM? As an aside to Inmos: will the H1 have an on-chip cache rather than on-chip RAM? It would be a real performance win. Cheers, -jeremy -- -- Jeremy Webber ACSnet: jeremy@chook.ua.oz Digital Arts Film and Television, Internet: jeremy@chook.ua.oz.au 3 Milner St, Hindmarsh, SA 5007, Voicenet: +61 8 346 4534 Australia Papernet: +61 8 346 4537 (FAX)