System using a unique marker with each software code-block

摘要

A system and method for improving software maintainability, performance, and/or security by associating a unique marker to each software code-block; the system comprising of a plurality of processors, a plurality of code-blocks, and a marker associated with each code-block. The system may also include a special hardware register (code-block marker hardware register) in each processor for identifying the markers of the code-blocks executed by the processor, without changing any of the plurality of code-blocks.

主权项

1. A system comprising:
a marker from a plurality of markers carried by a respective one of a plurality of code-blocks; a processor configured to detect a change in the marker in an instruction stream, and configured to identify whether to notify an operating system when there is a change in the marker; and a compiler/interpreter to determine the marker for each code-block and tag the code-block with the marker; wherein the plurality of code-blocks comprise an instruction set to be executed on the processor; wherein each of the plurality of code-blocks comprises at least one of a plurality of characteristics that define how the processor uses each of the plurality of code-blocks; wherein the processor uses each of the markers to differentiate between each of the plurality of code-blocks and tracks control transfers between any of the plurality of code-blocks.