Dispatching function calls across accelerator devices

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016283264-A1
Application number	US-201514744048-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Jun 19, 2015
Priority date	Mar 24, 2015
Publication date	Sep 29, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

In one embodiment, a computer-implemented method for dispatching a function call includes receiving, at a supervisor processing element (PE) and from an origin PE, an identifier of a target device, a stack frame of the origin PE, and an address of a function called from the origin PE. The supervisor PE allocates a target PE of the target device. The supervisor PE copies the stack frame of the origin PE to a new stack frame on a call stack of the target PE. The supervisor PE instructs the target PE to execute the function. The supervisor PE receives a notification that execution of the function is complete. The supervisor PE copies the stack frame of the target PE to the stack frame of the origin PE. The supervisor PE releases the target PE of the target device. The supervisor PE instructs the origin PE to resume execution of the program.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A computer-implemented method for dispatching a function call, the method comprising:
receiving, at a supervisor processing element (PE) and from an origin PE, an identifier of a target device, a stack frame of the origin PE, and an address of a function called from the origin PE; allocating, by the supervisor PE, a target PE of the target device; copying, by the supervisor PE, the stack frame of the origin PE to a new stack frame on a call stack of the target PE; instructing, by the supervisor PE, the target PE to execute the function at the address; receiving, by the supervisor PE, notification from the target PE that execution of the function is complete; copying, by the supervisor PE, the new stack frame on the call stack of the target PE to the stack frame of the origin PE; releasing, by the supervisor PE, the target PE of the target device; and instructing, by the supervisor PE, the origin PE to resume execution of the program.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the origin PE and the target PE reside on a same hardware accelerator.

3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the target device is a hardware accelerator, and wherein the origin PE resides on an origin device being a different hardware accelerator than the target device on which the target PE resides.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein the target device has a distinct memory space from the origin device, and wherein the copying the stack frame of the origin PE to the new stack frame on the call stack of the target PE comprises address translation.

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the target device and an origin device on which the origin PE resides have different architectures.

6 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the copying the stack frame of the origin PE to the new stack frame on the call stack of the target PE comprises marshalling data to comply with an architecture of the target PE.

7 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the supervisor PE is a PE on a hardware accelerator.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Jacob Arpith C
• Sallenave Olivier H

Classifications

• G06F9/547 Primary

  Remote procedure calls [RPC]; Web services · CPC title

• G06F9/54

  Interprogram communication · CPC title

• G06F9/485 Primary

  Task life-cycle, e.g. stopping, restarting, resuming execution (G06F9/4881 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G06F9/466

  Transaction processing · CPC title