초록 ▼

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 complexe

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.

대표청구항 ▼

The invention claimed is: 1. A method for transferring a packet from a shared input/output (I/O) endpoint to one of a plurality of OS Domains, within a load/store fabric of the plurality of OS Domains, comprising: embedding an OS Domain number with the packet to associate the packet with one of the

The invention claimed is: 1. A method for transferring a packet from a shared input/output (I/O) endpoint to one of a plurality of OS Domains, within a load/store fabric of the plurality of OS Domains, comprising: embedding an OS Domain number with the packet to associate the packet with one of the plurality of OS Domains; transferring the packet with the embedded OS Domain number to a shared I/O switch; examining the embedded OS Domain number to determine a port within the shared I/O switch associated with the one of the plurality of OS Domains; and transferring the packet to the one of the plurality of OS Domains using the port wherein the load/store fabric maps memory space for the shared I/O switch within memory space of the one of the plurality of OS Domains. 2. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein the shared input/output (I/O) endpoint comprises a network interface controller. 3. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein each of the plurality of OS Domains comprise: a processing complex; and memory, coupled to the processing complex for storing data utilized by the processing complex. 4. The method as recited in claim 3 wherein the processing complex comprises one or more processors. 5. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein the load/store fabric utilizes PCI Express. 6. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein said step of embedding comprises: forming an OS Header field; and including the OS Header field within the packet for transfer to the shared I/O switch. 7. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein said step of exammining comprises: performing a table lookup to associate the OS Domain number with a PCI bus hierarchy for the packet; and determining a port associated with the PCI bus hierarchy which is coupled to the OS Domain for the PCI bus hierarchy. 8. The method as recited in claim 1 wherein the port couples the shared I/O switch to the one of the plurality of OS Domains.