© 1968 by British Computer Society
Segmentation and virtual address topology—an essay in virtual research
Computer Science Dept., Upson Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA
This paper exhibits the hardware logic of a two-dimensional addressing scheme. This scheme has more elaborate facilities built into the hardware than the paging logic or segmenting logic of any machine I have seem proposed elsewhere. I do not put this logic forward as a proposal for yet another machine design; my purpose rather is to describe facilities that it would be possible to embed in a machine. They thus realise various possible virtual space topologies that could be provided for the designer of the operating system. Which one he chooses depends on what will most economically given the facilities he needs. Thus when describing hardware, I suggest some uses for it and point out conceptual difficulties that it does not resolve. It is not my purpose to exhibit the logic of the kinds of operating systems that such hardware services and which, itself, imposes what hardware is required. Fragmentary aspects will be found in the papers named in the bibliography to which the reader is recommended. Further, the necessary design process is to decide on the operating enbironment in which the users are to find themselves and then provide it by proper choice of software and hardware.
First received May 1967. revised form November 1967.
* Computer Science Dept., Upson Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.