An intelligent memory controller for dynamic data structures

The authors discuss a new hardware solution for certain dynamic-memory management tasks that need to be performed in modern computing systems such as multiprocessors, database machines, file servers, printer buffers, etc. The memory controller is built around a custom-designed datapath which is optimized for address computations. This datapath is controlled by a microprogram sequencer. For every new application, only the microcode program needs to be developed, while the hardware can remain unchanged. Furthermore, the controller can work as a stand-alone system, requiring no external processor to program it. The performance of this system is compared with that of an off-the-shelf direct memory access controller