Patent ID: 8156343

Claim:
A method for operating a data processing machine, comprising: a) applying by a processor an encoding process to private-state data, where the private-state data captures a state of the processor; b) writing, to a location in storage, said encoded private-state data, the location being one that is accessible to software by executing a first instruction of a plurality of instructions in the instruction set architecture of the processor, wherein execution of the first instruction causes the processor to read the encoded private-state data from the location without decoding the encoded private-state data to produce decoded private-state data; and c) recovering by the software the state of the processor by executing a second instruction of the plurality of instructions in the instruction set architecture of the processor, wherein execution of the second instruction causes the processor to read the encoded private-state data from the storage, decode the encoded private-state data to produce decoded private-state data, and store the decoded private-state data in the processor.