Patent ID: 11907100
Assignee: SIEMENS INDUSTRY SOFTWARE INC.
Field: Computer technology (Electrical engineering)
Classification: CPC G  H | IPC G  H

Claim 13:
14. An integrated circuit chip comprising:
a processor configured to execute instructions during clock cycles of the processor;
tracing circuitry configured to trace instruction execution of the processor in real time, the tracing circuitry comprising:
an instruction counter configured to count a number of successively retired instructions to form an instruction count, wherein the successively retired instructions are generated contiguously in time, and wherein the instruction counter is configured to stop counting when the instruction counter identifies a time gap in which the processor does not retire an instruction;
a stall counter configured to count a number of subsequent contiguous clock cycles of the processor during which no instruction is retired to form a stall count, wherein, in response to a signal from the instruction counter identifying that the instruction counter has stopped the counting, the stall counter is configured to start counting immediately following an end of a series of successively retired instructions that are generated contiguously in time;
a message generator configured to generate a trace message which comprises the instruction count and the stall count; and
an output configured to output the trace message.