Fitting processors to the needs of a General Purpose Array (EGPA)
Wolfgang Händler, Rainer Klar · 1975
1.1 General Purpose ProcessorThe vast majority of contemporary processors can be described as general purpose processors (GPP), with a structure often referred to as “von Neumann”.1.2 Associative Array ProcessorIn addition special processors have been developed for dedicated applications, some involving parallel processing. The associative array processors (AAP) [2] or the synchronous array processors like ILLIAC IV [3] are answers to the challenge of parallel processing.This paper examines whether these two, apparently very different, types of processors can be united in a single design. To achieve this a Conventional GPP is extended by additional logic, such that additional microprograms and possibly additional microoperations are included in the control unit and in the arithmetic unit.