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Innovating with OpenSPARC

Tuesday March 6, 2007
Hamerschlag Hall D-210
4:30 pm



David Weaver
Sun Microsystems

Sun surprised the industry in March 2006 by releasing the source code of its newest microprocessor design, UltraSPARC T1 (a.k.a. "Niagara") to the world in /open-source/ form. OpenSPARC T1 is a 64-bit, 8-core, 32-thread design, which may easily be configured for any combination of 1, 2, 4, or 8 cores and 1, 2, or 4 threads per core. It is still the only 64-bit open-source processor and the only chip multi-threaded (CMT) open-source processor available. This talk will describe why Sun chose a CMT design for this processor, some details about the UltraSPARC T1 implementation, how the OpenSPARC community is organized, what is available with OpenSPARC, and university programs that Sun is developing around OpenSPARC (http://OpenSPARC.net).


David Weaver has been involved with SPARC for over 20 years. He hired on at Sun to lead the SPARC software effort (compilers, OS port, etc.) and became active on Sun's SPARC Architecture Committee. He has been responsible for every published SPARC Architecture specification, including SPARC V8, SPARC V9, UltraSPARC Architecture 2005, and others. He's charged with overseeing consistency and binary compatibility of Sun's SPARC implementations, across implementations and over time. He has served as chair of SPARC International's Architecture Committee and holds a patent for an innovation in processor architecture.

Outside of Sun, Dave is a father of two, avid photographer, and instrument-rated private pilot.

 

Department of Electrical and Computer EngineeringCarnegie Mellon UniversitySchool of Computer Science