摘要 |
The present invention provides a system with a cache that indicates which, if any, of its sections contain data having spent status. The invention also provides a method for identifying cache sections containing data having spent status and then purging without writing back to main memory a cache line having at least one section containing data having spent status. The invention further provides a program that specifies a cache-line section containing data that is to acquire "spent" status. "Spent" data, herein, is useless modified or unmodified data that was formerly at least potentially useful data when it was written to a cache. "Purging" encompasses both invalidating and overwriting.
|