This patch changes the cache-related latencies from an absolute time
expressed in Ticks, to a number of cycles that can be scaled with the
clock period of the caches. Ultimately this patch serves to enable
future work that involves dynamic frequency scaling. As an immediate
benefit it also makes it more convenient to specify cache performance
without implicitly assuming a specific CPU core operating frequency.
The stat blocked_cycles that actually counter in ticks is now updated
to count in cycles.
As the timing is now rounded to the clock edges of the cache, there
are some regressions that change. Plenty of them have very minor
changes, whereas some regressions with a short run-time are perturbed
quite significantly. A follow-on patch updates all the statistics for
the regressions.
In the current caches the hit latency is paid twice on a miss. This patch lets
a configurable response latency be set of the cache for the backward path.
This patch introduces a class hierarchy of buses, a non-coherent one,
and a coherent one, splitting the existing bus functionality. By doing
so it also enables further specialisation of the two types of buses.
A non-coherent bus connects a number of non-snooping masters and
slaves, and routes the request and response packets based on the
address. The request packets issued by the master connected to a
non-coherent bus could still snoop in caches attached to a coherent
bus, as is the case with the I/O bus and memory bus in most system
configurations. No snoops will, however, reach any master on the
non-coherent bus itself. The non-coherent bus can be used as a
template for modelling PCI, PCIe, and non-coherent AMBA and OCP buses,
and is typically used for the I/O buses.
A coherent bus connects a number of (potentially) snooping masters and
slaves, and routes the request and response packets based on the
address, and also forwards all requests to the snoopers and deals with
the snoop responses. The coherent bus can be used as a template for
modelling QPI, HyperTransport, ACE and coherent OCP buses, and is
typically used for the L1-to-L2 buses and as the main system
interconnect.
The configuration scripts are updated to use a NoncoherentBus for all
peripheral and I/O buses.
A bit of minor tidying up has also been done.
--HG--
rename : src/mem/bus.cc => src/mem/coherent_bus.cc
rename : src/mem/bus.hh => src/mem/coherent_bus.hh
rename : src/mem/bus.cc => src/mem/noncoherent_bus.cc
rename : src/mem/bus.hh => src/mem/noncoherent_bus.hh
This patch removes the assumption on having on single instance of
PhysicalMemory, and enables a distributed memory where the individual
memories in the system are each responsible for a single contiguous
address range.
All memories inherit from an AbstractMemory that encompasses the basic
behaviuor of a random access memory, and provides untimed access
methods. What was previously called PhysicalMemory is now
SimpleMemory, and a subclass of AbstractMemory. All future types of
memory controllers should inherit from AbstractMemory.
To enable e.g. the atomic CPU and RubyPort to access the now
distributed memory, the system has a wrapper class, called
PhysicalMemory that is aware of all the memories in the system and
their associated address ranges. This class thus acts as an
infinitely-fast bus and performs address decoding for these "shortcut"
accesses. Each memory can specify that it should not be part of the
global address map (used e.g. by the functional memories by some
testers). Moreover, each memory can be configured to be reported to
the OS configuration table, useful for populating ATAG structures, and
any potential ACPI tables.
Checkpointing support currently assumes that all memories have the
same size and organisation when creating and resuming from the
checkpoint. A future patch will enable a more flexible
re-organisation.
--HG--
rename : src/mem/PhysicalMemory.py => src/mem/AbstractMemory.py
rename : src/mem/PhysicalMemory.py => src/mem/SimpleMemory.py
rename : src/mem/physical.cc => src/mem/abstract_mem.cc
rename : src/mem/physical.hh => src/mem/abstract_mem.hh
rename : src/mem/physical.cc => src/mem/simple_mem.cc
rename : src/mem/physical.hh => src/mem/simple_mem.hh
This patch adds a creation-time check to the CPU to ensure that the
interrupt controller is created for the cases where it is needed,
i.e. if the CPU is not being switched in later and not a checker CPU.
The patch also adds the "createInterruptController" call to a number
of the regression scripts.
This patch classifies all ports in Python as either Master or Slave
and enforces a binding of master to slave. Conceptually, a master (such
as a CPU or DMA port) issues requests, and receives responses, and
conversely, a slave (such as a memory or a PIO device) receives
requests and sends back responses. Currently there is no
differentiation between coherent and non-coherent masters and slaves.
The classification as master/slave also involves splitting the dual
role port of the bus into a master and slave port and updating all the
system assembly scripts to use the appropriate port. Similarly, the
interrupt devices have to have their int_port split into a master and
slave port. The intdev and its children have minimal changes to
facilitate the extra port.
Note that this patch does not enforce any port typing in the C++
world, it merely ensures that the Python objects have a notion of the
port roles and are connected in an appropriate manner. This check is
carried when two ports are connected, e.g. bus.master =
memory.port. The following patches will make use of the
classifications and specialise the C++ ports into masters and slaves.
Port proxies are used to replace non-structural ports, and thus enable
all ports in the system to correspond to a structural entity. This has
the advantage of accessing memory through the normal memory subsystem
and thus allowing any constellation of distributed memories, address
maps, etc. Most accesses are done through the "system port" that is
used for loading binaries, debugging etc. For the entities that belong
to the CPU, e.g. threads and thread contexts, they wrap the CPU data
port in a port proxy.
The following replacements are made:
FunctionalPort > PortProxy
TranslatingPort > SETranslatingPortProxy
VirtualPort > FSTranslatingPortProxy
--HG--
rename : src/mem/vport.cc => src/mem/fs_translating_port_proxy.cc
rename : src/mem/vport.hh => src/mem/fs_translating_port_proxy.hh
rename : src/mem/translating_port.cc => src/mem/se_translating_port_proxy.cc
rename : src/mem/translating_port.hh => src/mem/se_translating_port_proxy.hh
This change fixes the problem for all the cases we actively use. If you want to try
more creative I/O device attachments (E.g. sharing an L2), this won't work. You
would need another level of caching between the I/O device and the cache
(which you actually need anyway with our current code to make sure writes
propagate). This is required so that you can mark the cache in between as
top level and it won't try to send ownership of a block to the I/O device.
Asserts have been added that should catch any issues.
This makes sure that the address ranges requested for caches and uncached ports
don't conflict with each other, and that accesses which are always uncached
(message signaled interrupts for instance) don't waste time passing through
caches.
Get rid of misc.py and just stick misc things in __init__.py
Move utility functions out of SCons files and into m5.util
Move utility type stuff from m5/__init__.py to m5/util/__init__.py
Remove buildEnv from m5 and allow access only from m5.defines
Rename AddToPath to addToPath while we're moving it to m5.util
Rename read_command to readCommand while we're moving it
Rename compare_versions to compareVersions while we're moving it.
--HG--
rename : src/python/m5/convert.py => src/python/m5/util/convert.py
rename : src/python/m5/smartdict.py => src/python/m5/util/smartdict.py