Patent ID: 8327188

Claim:
A method for executing instructions in a transactional-scout mode in a processor, comprising: transactionally executing instructions in the processor from a protected section of program code; entering the transactional-scout mode and speculatively executing subsequent instructions in the transactional-scout mode when the transactional execution of the protected section of program causes a transactional failure condition; executing subsequent instructions in the transactional-scout mode until the transactional failure condition is resolved or until the transactional failure condition and one or more additional transactional failure conditions are resolved; and responsive to the transactional failure condition being resolved, returning to a normal-execution mode to execute instructions from a fail PC, wherein a COMMIT instruction indicates an end of the protected section of program code, and wherein executing subsequent instructions in the transactional-scout mode comprises: executing the instructions in the protected section including the COMMIT instruction in the transactional-scout mode, but preventing any transactional results from being committed to an architectural state of the processor in response to executing the COMMIT instruction; and continuing to execute instructions following the protected section in the transactional-scout mode until the transactional failure condition is resolved.