Patent ID: 7484061
Filing Date: 2009-01-27
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
1. A method for performing a swap operation between an accessible memory cell and a background memory in an embedded memory of a computer, comprising: (a) decoding a memory address of the accessible memory cell and a background memory cell to be used in the swap operation, wherein the background memory cell resides within the background memory; (b) restoring data from the background memory cell to the accessible memory cell, whereby previous data content of the accessible memory cell is overwritten, wherein the data restored to the accessible memory cell is available for reading from the embedded memory following the restoring; (c) saving data content of a shadow memory cell to the background memory; and (d) saving data content of the accessible memory cell to the shadow memory cell such that the accessible memory cell and shadow memory cell store a same data content, wherein operations (a)-(d) are performed in a sequential manner, and wherein the accessible memory cell, the background memory, and the shadow memory cell are defined within an embedded memory, and wherein the accessible memory cell is directly accessible from outside the embedded memory by a number of threads operating on the computer such that data can be written to and read from the accessible memory cell by the number of threads operating on the computer, and wherein each of the background memory and the shadow memory cell is not directly accessible by the number of threads operating on the computer.