Transactional memory having local CAM and NFA resources

摘要

A remote processor interacts with a transactional memory that has a memory, local BWC (Byte-Wise Compare) resources, and local NFA (Non-deterministic Finite Automaton) engine resources. The processor causes a byte stream to be transferred into the transactional memory and into the memory. The processor then uses the BWC circuit to find a character signature in the byte stream. The processor obtains information about the character signature from the BWC circuit, and based on the information uses the NFA engine to process the byte stream starting at a byte position determined based at least in part on the results of the BWC circuit. From the time the byte stream is initially written into the transactional memory until the time the NFA engine completes, the byte stream is not read out of the transactional memory.

主权项

1. A method comprising:
(a) causing a byte stream to be transferred into a transactional memory and to be stored into a memory of the transactional memory, wherein the transactional memory includes the memory, a BWC (Byte-Wise Comparator) circuit and an NFA (Non-deterministic Finite Automaton) engine; (b) causing the transactional memory to use the BWC circuit to find a character signature in the byte stream thereby determining byte position information indicative of a byte position of the character signature in the byte stream; (c) receiving the byte position information from the transactional memory; and (d) causing the NFA engine to use a first NFA to process the byte stream starting at a byte position determined based at least in part on the byte position information of (b), wherein (a) through (d) are performed by a processor that is not a part of the transactional memory, and wherein the byte stream is not read out of the transactional memory at any time between the transferring of (a) until the processing of (d) is completed.