Patent ID: 8423752

Claim:
Apparatus for processing data, said apparatus comprising: processing circuitry for performing data processing operations comprising permutation circuitry for performing permutation operations; a register bank having a plurality of registers for storing data; control circuitry, responsive to program instructions, configured to control said processing circuitry to perform said data processing operations; wherein said control circuitry is configured to be responsive to a control-generating instruction to generate, in dependence upon a bit-mask, control signal's to configure said permutation circuitry for performing a permutation operation on an input operand comprising data stored in one or more registers of said register bank; wherein said bit-mask identifies within said input operand a first group of data elements having a first ordering and a second group of data elements having a second ordering, said permutation operation preserves one but changes the other of said first ordering and said second ordering, and both of said first and second groups of data elements comprise data stored in said register bank.