This changesets adds branch predictor support to the
BaseSimpleCPU. The simple CPUs normally don't need a branch predictor,
however, there are at least two cases where it can be desirable:
1) A simple CPU can be used to warm the branch predictor of an O3
CPU before switching to the slower O3 model.
2) The simple CPU can be used as a quick way of evaluating/debugging
new branch predictors since it exposes branch predictor
statistics.
Limitations:
* Since the simple CPU doesn't speculate, only one instruction will
be active in the branch predictor at a time (i.e., the branch
predictor will never see speculative branches).
* The outcome of a branch prediction does not affect the performance
of the simple CPU.
When casting objects in the generated SWIG interfaces, SWIG uses
classical C-style casts ( (Foo *)bar; ). In some cases, this can
degenerate into the equivalent of a reinterpret_cast (mainly if only a
forward declaration of the type is available). This usually works for
most compilers, but it is known to break if multiple inheritance is
used anywhere in the object hierarchy.
This patch introduces the cxx_header attribute to Python SimObject
definitions, which should be used to specify a header to include in
the SWIG interface. The header should include the declaration of the
wrapped object. We currently don't enforce header the use of the
header attribute, but a warning will be generated for objects that do
not use it.
Enables the CheckerCPU to be selected at runtime with the --checker option
from the configs/example/fs.py and configs/example/se.py configuration
files. Also merges with the SE/FS changes.
Brings the CheckerCPU back to life to allow FS and SE checking of the
O3CPU. These changes have only been tested with the ARM ISA. Other
ISAs potentially require modification.
A whole bunch of stuff has been converted to use the new params stuff, but
the CPU wasn't one of them. While we're at it, make some things a bit
more stylish. Most of the work was done by Gabe, I just cleaned stuff up
a bit more at the end.
