Patent ID: 6338135
Filing Date: 2002-01-08
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
A method of operating a data processing system to perform an arithmetic operation on p signed n-bit data values in 2âˆ’s complement form, wherein p and n are positive integers, said method comprising the steps of:encoding the p signed n-bit data values as a composite value, said composite value comprising p n-bit fields, by an encoding operation equivalent to aligning each signed data value with a respective n-bit field, sign extending each signed data value to the most significant bit of the composite value, and adding the aligned and sign extended data values to form the composite value; applying the arithmetic operation to the composite value to produce an encoded result comprising p n-bit fields; and decoding the encoded result to produce p final results by applying a decoding operation equivalent to extracting the data from each n-bit field of the encoded result and correcting for any effect caused by the addition of an adjacent sign extended data value by the encoding operation; whereby each final result represents the application of the arithmetic operation to a corresponding signed n-bit data value, provided that each signed data value encoded into composite value would not have overflowed or underflowed had the arithmetic operation been applied to them directly.