Patent ID: 7747897

Claim:
A method comprising: simultaneously generating a first request at a first computer device to access a system resource and generating a second request at a second computer device, in communication with the first computer device, to access the system resource, the first computer device being closer to the system resource while the second computer device being farther from the system resource, wherein the computer devices are designated as closer and farther to indicate their position on a fixed-latency interconnect relative to the system resource; receiving, at the first computer device that is closer to the system resource, the second request from the second computer device that is farther from the system resources to access the system resource over the fixed-latency interconnect; comparing the first request to the second request; if the first request matches the second request, merging the first request and the second request into a merged request and sending the merged request over the fixed-latency interconnect to the system resource from the first computer device; and if the first request differs from the second request, generating a lockstep error and signaling a lockstep failure in response to the lockstep error.