Patent ID: 8356161

Claim:
An integrated circuit for performing an operation having at least a simple computational function and a complex processing function, the circuit for performing an operation having at least a simple computational function and a complex processing function, the circuit comprising: a configurable simple computational unit including a plurality of heterogeneous computational elements coupled to each other via a first interconnection network to configure interconnections between selected ones of the computational elements in response to configuration information to perform the simple computational function of the operation, wherein the configured interconnections remain fixed during the performance of the simple computational function; a configurable complex processing unit including a second plurality of heterogeneous computational elements coupled to each other via a second interconnection network to configure the interconnections between selected ones of the second plurality of computational elements in response to the configuration information to perform the complex processing function of the operation, wherein the configured interconnections remain fixed during the performance of the complex processing function; and a third interconnection network coupled to the configurable simple computational unit and the configurable complex processing unit, the third interconnection network sending the configuration information to the simple computational unit and the complex processing unit.