Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!decwrl!hplabs!cae780!leadsv!pyramid!prls!mips!earl
From: earl@mips.COM (Earl Killian)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Curb feelers (was: Cray architecture)
Message-ID: <2087@gumby.mips.COM>
Date: 27 Apr 88 00:07:14 GMT
References: <7762@alice.UUCP> <418@ole.UUCP> <3216@phri.UUCP> <1574@osiris.UUCP> <505@xios.XIOS.UUCP> <4777@cup.portal.com> <9357@weitek.UUCP>
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In-reply-to: rober@weitek.UUCP's message of 26 Apr 88 16:45:04 GMT


My favorite cpu meter was on the MIT AI Lab PDP-10 in the mid 70's.
AI had about 20 bitmap screens connected to it, and could memory map
the frame buffers.  The operating system (ITS) would execute a SETOM
to your frame buffer (store -1) when it began running one of your
processes, and a SETZM (store 0) when it stopped.  Thus your display
had a 36-pixel bar in the corner that flashed on and off, showing when
you were getting cpu cycles.  The best 2-instruction performance monitor
I ever saw.
-- 
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