Method and apparatus for shared I/O in a load/store fabric
First Claim
1. An Ethernet controller which processes packets received from a plurality of root complexes via a serial load/store fabric, the Ethernet controller comprising:
- a bus interface coupled to the serial load/store fabric, said bus interface associating each of the packets with their root complex; and
control register logic, having a plurality of control registers, wherein each of said plurality of control registers is selectable to service at least one of the root complexes based on the association of the packets with their originating root complex;
wherein said bus interface further comprises a multiplexer for selecting at least one of said plurality of control registers based on the associating performed by said bus interface.
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Accused Products
Abstract
An apparatus and method is provided for allowing I/O devices to be shared and/or partitioned among a plurality of processing complexes within the load/store fabric of each of the processing complexes without requiring modification to the operating system or driver software of the processing complexes. The apparatus and method includes a switch for selectively coupling each of the processing complexes to one or more shared I/O devices. The apparatus and method further includes placing information within packets transmitted between the switch and the I/O devices to identify which of the processing complexes the packets are associated with. The invention further includes an apparatus and method within the shared I/O devices to allow the shared I/O devices to service each of the processing complexes independently.
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Citations
25 Claims
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1. An Ethernet controller which processes packets received from a plurality of root complexes via a serial load/store fabric, the Ethernet controller comprising:
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a bus interface coupled to the serial load/store fabric, said bus interface associating each of the packets with their root complex; and control register logic, having a plurality of control registers, wherein each of said plurality of control registers is selectable to service at least one of the root complexes based on the association of the packets with their originating root complex; wherein said bus interface further comprises a multiplexer for selecting at least one of said plurality of control registers based on the associating performed by said bus interface. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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20. A shared network interface controller comprising:
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a bus interface configured to be coupled to a serial load/store fabric; and a plurality of control registers selectable by said bus interface to be associated with packets from a plurality of root complexes; wherein said bus interface comprises a lookup table for associating said plurality of control registers with said plurality of root complexes; and wherein said bus interface further comprises a multiplexer for selecting the plurality of control registers utilizing information within said lookup table. - View Dependent Claims (21, 22, 23)
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24. An Ethernet controller which processes packets received from a plurality of root complexes via a serial load/store fabric, the Ethernet controller comprising:
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a bus interface coupled to the serial load/store fabric, said bus interface associating each of the packets with their root complex; and control register logic, having a plurality of control registers, wherein each of said plurality of control registers is selectable to service at least one of the root complexes based on the association of the packets with their originating root complex; a plurality of direct memory access (DMA) engines, each for handling packets from at least one of the plurality of root complexes; and arbitration logic, coupled to said plurality of direct memory access engines, for arbitrating selection of said plurality of direct memory access engines used to process the packets received by the Ethernet controller from the plurality of root complexes. - View Dependent Claims (25)
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Specification