10 ms·

Yes, they say Clockhands is a straight up a type of belt, which they've patented: https://millcomputing.com/topic/tokyo-universitys-straight-compiler/#post-395

Yes, they say Clockhands is a straight up a type of belt, which they've patented: https://millcomputing.com/topic/tokyo-universitys-straight-compiler/#post-3958 https://millcomputing.com/topic/tokyo-universitys-straight-c...

ralferoo 3y ago
Yeah, I came here to comment that this sounded very similar to the belt. The comment numbered 3929 on the link you provided is useful as it succinctly explains the difference: The addressing (STRAIGHT vs Mill) is different: STRAIGHT refers to the generating instruction in time order, whereas Mill refers to the dropped result. In the hardware STRAIGHT uses a scoreboard approach to block for uncompleted instructions, while Mill uses full static scheduling. Some benefits are shared: no renaming, no encoded result registers. Some are peculiar to one or the other: Mill needs no reorder buffer, while straight need not track instruction retire time in the compiler.
- ralferoo 3y ago
  Actually, after my third reading, I don't think it does infringe on their patent. The last comment on the GP link (3958) states: "The STRAIGHT addressing is not a belt because it uses ordinal instruction addressing, while a belt uses ordinal drop. But the new Clockhands addressing is a belt, pure and simple." But after re-reading the article again, it sounds like it genuinely is an extension of the STRAIGHT system to just add 4 groups of "ordinal instruction addressed" registers rather. It still definitely doesn't fulfil the criteria for "ordinal drop" as described in the comment (by the same author) that I quoted above.
  - PoignardAzur 3y ago
    The Mill patent is here: https://millcomputing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/uspto9513921.pdf https://millcomputing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/us... I think it covers the STRAIGHT addressing method. IANAL though.
rwmj 3y ago
There was a lot to be said for the original patent application process where you had to file an instance of a working machine using the process along with your patent application.
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  I think for any reasonable version of that rule, an FPGA version would be good enough. And I'm pretty confident that if it was necessary for the patents, they can and would have built basic FPGA versions. So while there are certainly adjustments to make to the patent system, I don't think that particular rule would have changed anything here.
  - rbanffy 3y ago
    > they can and would have built basic FPGA versions. A lot of patents wouldn't be even filed if they required that kind of investment. This is not an afternoon of work. I guess it'd be great if patents of ideas that were never reduced to practice never existed.
    - Dylan16807 3y ago
      "they" is the Mill team.

ralferoo 3y ago

Yeah, I came here to comment that this sounded very similar to the belt. The comment numbered 3929 on the link you provided is useful as it succinctly explains the difference: The addressing (STRAIGHT vs Mill) is different: STRAIGHT refers to the generating instruction in time order, whereas Mill refers to the dropped result. In the hardware STRAIGHT uses a scoreboard approach to block for uncompleted instructions, while Mill uses full static scheduling. Some benefits are shared: no renaming, no encoded result registers. Some are peculiar to one or the other: Mill needs no reorder buffer, while straight need not track instruction retire time in the compiler.

ralferoo 3y ago
Actually, after my third reading, I don't think it does infringe on their patent. The last comment on the GP link (3958) states: "The STRAIGHT addressing is not a belt because it uses ordinal instruction addressing, while a belt uses ordinal drop. But the new Clockhands addressing is a belt, pure and simple." But after re-reading the article again, it sounds like it genuinely is an extension of the STRAIGHT system to just add 4 groups of "ordinal instruction addressed" registers rather. It still definitely doesn't fulfil the criteria for "ordinal drop" as described in the comment (by the same author) that I quoted above.
- PoignardAzur 3y ago
  The Mill patent is here: https://millcomputing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/uspto9513921.pdf https://millcomputing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/us... I think it covers the STRAIGHT addressing method. IANAL though.

rwmj 3y ago

There was a lot to be said for the original patent application process where you had to file an instance of a working machine using the process along with your patent application.

Dylan16807 3y ago
I think for any reasonable version of that rule, an FPGA version would be good enough. And I'm pretty confident that if it was necessary for the patents, they can and would have built basic FPGA versions. So while there are certainly adjustments to make to the patent system, I don't think that particular rule would have changed anything here.
- rbanffy 3y ago
  > they can and would have built basic FPGA versions. A lot of patents wouldn't be even filed if they required that kind of investment. This is not an afternoon of work. I guess it'd be great if patents of ideas that were never reduced to practice never existed.
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    "they" is the Mill team.