I was actually thinking about this on and off...

First off, I totally agree with Nate. It wiill take a pretty big code
overhaul to get the CPUs to be ISA dependent.

Second, the ways I thought it might work is:
(1) Somehow link 2 M5 binaries and have them interface through the
same EventQueue. I'm not sure how ISA independent devices/memory are
though so another opinion would be needed to flesh out the feasibility
of that idea.

(2) Turn the "TheISA" namespace into an object. A overly conservative
way to do it would be to capture all of the ISA information into say
an "AlphaISA" class containing literally everything in the
src/arch/alpha/* folder (regfiles, process objects, etc.). Then, you
could just pass the ISA into the CPU model and wherever you see a
TheISA::func() you can turn it into a theISA->func(). Mind you, that
would be a not-so efficient way to do things but on a first cut that
is what makes sense to me if you want to start making ISA objects
portable instead of hard-coded in.

Again, not-so-easy to do and definitely a good chunk of time/effort.

On Wed, May 20, 2009 at 12:12 PM, nathan binkert <[email protected]> wrote:
> Heterogeneous ISAs would require a significant amount of work.  It's
> certainly not impossible, but it would require the removal of the
> THE_ISA define and a bunch of compiler stuff to create CPUs for each
> ISA.
>
>  Nate
>
> On Wed, May 20, 2009 at 12:02 AM, Rick Strong <[email protected]> wrote:
>> It is supported as long as you use a single-isa for all the cores. At
>> most, you will just have to hack on the configuration of the cores you
>> want. Multiple-ISAs might be possible, but Nathan knows more about the
>> issues that you would need to develop through.
>>
>> Good luck,
>> -Rick
>>
>> ASHMAWY Amr wrote:
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> I'm starting research on scheduling for heterogeneous multicore
>>> I was advised to try M5 simulator, I couldn't find guidance whether it 
>>> supports
>>> such architecture or not.
>>>
>>> Can someone help me if it's supported or not?
>>> TIA
>>>
>>> Best Regards
>>> --------------------------------------------------
>>> Amr M. M. Ashmawy
>>> Doctor Student
>>> Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> m5-users mailing list
>>> [email protected]
>>> http://m5sim.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/m5-users
>>>
>>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> m5-users mailing list
>> [email protected]
>> http://m5sim.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/m5-users
>>
>>
> _______________________________________________
> m5-users mailing list
> [email protected]
> http://m5sim.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/m5-users
>



-- 
- Korey
_______________________________________________
m5-users mailing list
[email protected]
http://m5sim.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/m5-users

Reply via email to