Patent ID: 6148376
Filing Date: 2000-11-14
Classification: G06F,G06T

Abstract:
An apparatus for an MRU stack, said apparatus directly or indirectly connected to a stack search requesting unit, stack search requesting unit specifying a command and a data value to said MRU stack, said apparatus comprising:means for receiving a command;means for receiving a data value;a stack data module for storing one or more stack data values, said stack data module being coupled to said data value receiving means for receiving a data value as input;a stack pointer module for referencing stack data values stored in said stack data module, said stack pointer module being coupled to said stack data module to provide as input a reference to one or more stack data values, said stack pointer module including a set of data multiplexers, including one or more multiplexers, a set of registers, including one or more registers wherein an MRU register specifies, either directly or indirectly, a location of a most-recently-used stack data value and an LRU register specifies, either directly or indirectly, a location of a least-recently-used stack data value, and an address multiplexer, said data multiplexers and registers configured such that for each register in the set of registers, there is a corresponding multiplexer in the set of data multiplexers, said corresponding multiplexer arranged and coupled to its corresponding register to receive one or more inputs and provide an output to the corresponding register, the registers in said set of registers arranged and interconnected by the multiplexers such that data values are specified from a most-recently-used data value down to a least-recently-used data value; anda stack control module for the MRU stack, said stack control module being coupled to said command receiving means for receiving a command as input and further being arranged to transmit an output to the stack search requesting unit, said stack control module further being coupled to said stack pointer module to provide operational control of the stack pointer module functions, said stack control module further being coupled to said stack data module to provide control of the accessing of data to and from the stack data module and to receive as input a stack data value, said stack control module further being coupled to said data value receiving means for receiving a data value as input.