JPH09160860A - Data processing device - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Abstract] [PROBLEMS] Even if the data processing of software is replaced with hardware, it is not necessary to drastically change the software. A software processing device 10 that functions similarly to a hardware processing device 7 is provided in the kernel space, and even if the processing device is switched from the software 10 to the hardware 7, the software does not need to be changed.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a data processing device in which an operating system is preset in a kernel space and various application programs are rewritably set in a user space.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Generally, a data processing device such as a microcomputer or a workstation has a CPU (Central Processing Unit) as a hardware and a memory, and a kernel in which software is set in the memory. A space and a user space are virtually provided. An operating system is preset in the kernel space, and various application programs are rewritably set in the user space.

For example, when the user sets a desired application program in the user space, the data processing is executed under the integrated control of the operating system. However, when various operations are executed by data processing of software in this way, for example, when outputting a high-resolution color image, the amount of data is enormous, so that the processing load on the CPU is large and the processing speed is low.

For this reason, in actual data processing apparatuses, when it is expected that data processing such as image output is required, many models are provided with a processing device used for the data processing by hardware. In general, hardware has a higher processing speed than software, so that data processing by an application program can be executed at high speed. Further, if the data processing is executed by hardware, the processing load on the CPU can be reduced, and the operating rate of parallel processing can be improved.

However, in reality, there are times when optimum hardware does not exist at the time of manufacturing a data processing device,
In such a case, it is necessary to execute necessary data processing by software, so a predetermined program is described in the application program and the operating system. Such a data processing device can execute necessary data processing by software. However, as described above, data processing of software has problems of speed and burden. It is natural to use it for new products. Similarly, when optimal hardware is developed after shipping a product that executes predetermined data processing by software, this may be used for version upgrade of the shipped product.

[0006]

In the data processing apparatus having the processing device provided by hardware as described above,
Data processing can be executed at high speed, and the processing load on the CPU can be reduced.

However, when a data processing apparatus that executes predetermined data processing by software is switched to a data processing apparatus that executes the data processing by hardware, a control driver or the like for driving and controlling the processing device of hardware is set by software. It is necessary to newly install it.
In other words, it is difficult to develop a new product or upgrade the version of an existing device because the application program and the operating system need to be significantly modified.

[0008]

According to the first aspect of the present invention,
In a data processing device having a kernel space in which an operating system is preset and a user space in which various application programs are rewritably set, a processing device used for data processing of the application program is processed by the kernel by software. Set up in space. Therefore, even if the software processing device is replaced with the hardware processing device, a drastic change in the operating system or the application program is not required.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in the first aspect of the present invention, a device port to which a hardware processing device is attached is provided, and attachment detection means for detecting attachment of the processing device to the device port is provided. Corresponding to this detection, device switching means is provided for switching the target of data processing of the application program from the software processing device to the hardware processing device. Therefore, when the hardware processing device is mounted on the data processing device that executes the data processing by the software processing device, the data processing is executed by the hardware processing device thereafter.

According to a third aspect of the present invention, in the second aspect of the present invention, a device port to which a hardware processing device is attached is provided, and an application program data processing target is a software processing device from the hardware processing device. Device switching means for switching to a processing device of the hardware, and failure detection means for detecting a malfunction of the processing device of the hardware are provided. Switch from a ware processing device to a software processing device.
Therefore, when a malfunction occurs in the hardware processing device that executes data processing, the data processing is taken over by the software processing device.

[0011]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS One embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. First, as shown in FIG. 1, the data processing device 1 according to the present embodiment has a CPU (Central Process).
ssing unit) 2, and the CPU 2 is connected to the bus line 3. A memory 4, various I / O (Input / Output) 5, and a device port 6 are connected to the bus line 3, and a hardware processing device 7 is detachably attached to the device port 6. It

As shown in FIG. 2, the memory 4 has a kernel space 8 and a user space 9, an operating system is preset in the kernel space 8, and an application program is set in the user space 9. Is set to be rewritable. Although the spaces 8 and 9 are expressed in the same manner as the storage area of the memory 4 here,
This is actually a virtual space in which data processing by each software is executed.

The data processing apparatus 1 according to the present embodiment can execute data processing such as outputting image data to a laser printer, and an application program for executing such data processing is stored in the user space 9 Is rewritably stored in. This data processing includes processing of image data, and the processing device 7 executes the processing of this image data. A software processing device that functions similarly to the hardware processing device 7 is provided in the kernel space 8 as a virtual device 10 here, and selectively drives and controls the virtual device 10 and the processing device 7. A control driver (not shown) for controlling is also provided in the kernel space 8.

Further, the data processing device 1 of the present embodiment.
Is mounting detection means, defect detection means, device switching means,
(Neither is shown). The mounting detection means is configured to process the processing device 7 for the device port 6.
Is detected, and the defect detecting means detects an operation defect of the processing device 7 attached to the device port 6. Such a thing is realized, for example, by the CPU 2 transmitting a predetermined signal to the device port 6 and determining the signal to be returned.

When the attachment detecting means detects that the processing device 7 is not attached to the device port 6, the device switching means connects the virtual device 10 to the control driver in response to the detection. When the attachment detecting means detects that the processing device 7 is attached to the device port 6 as an application program use target, the processing device 7 is connected to the control driver in response to the detection, and the application program Use it. However, the processing device 7 attached to the device port 6 in such a state
When the failure detecting means detects the operation failure of, the corresponding virtual device 10 is connected to the control driver to be used by the application program.

In such a configuration, the data processing device 1 of the present embodiment is set so that various application programs can be rewritten, and various data processes can be executed corresponding to the set application programs. it can. For example, image processing can be executed as data processing, and this image processing can be selectively executed by the hardware processing device 7 and the software virtual device 10.

The data processing apparatus 1 according to the present embodiment is shipped as a product without the hardware processing device 7 attached, and in this state, the virtual device 10 of software executes image processing. However, when the hardware processing device 7 is attached due to the version upgrade, the processing device 7 automatically switches to a state in which image processing is executed. In addition, when a malfunction occurs in the hardware processing device 7 in such a state, the image processing is performed by the software virtual device 10.
Automatically taken over by.

The processing operation of the data processing apparatus 1 will be described below with reference to FIGS. 2 and 3. First, as shown in FIG. 3, the mounting of the processing device 7 is confirmed when the data processing apparatus 1 is started, and if this mounting is not detected, the data processing by the virtual device 10 is set. When image processing is started in such a state, a device open request is output from the application program in the user space 9 to the operating system in the kernel space 8 as shown in FIG. The virtual device 10 in the space 8 is opened.

At this time, the data size of the image processing is detected in the user space 9 (step US1), and after the virtual device 10 is initialized in the kernel space 8, a storage area of the data size is secured in the memory 4. This storage area is mapped so that it can be referred to in both spaces 8 and 9 (step SS1), and its start address is communicated from the kernel space 8 to the user space 9. In this user space 9, image data is read and mask parameters for image processing are set (steps US2 and US3), and the mask parameters are notified to the control driver in the kernel space 8 (step SS2).

Next, an application program sets a start flag for image processing in the user space 9 corresponding to the mask parameter (step US4), and in the kernel space 8, the control driver virtualizes the mask parameter and the start flag in correspondence with the mask parameter. The device 10 is driven and controlled. Image processing is performed on the image data in the kernel space 8 by the virtual device 10, and the image data is stored in the memory 4
Is written in the mapped storage area (step SS3).

When this image processing is completed, for example, image data is written in the page memory or the like in the user space 9 (step US5), and is output from the page memory to the laser printer and used for printing. When such data processing is completed, the application program of the user space 9 outputs a device close request to the operating system of the kernel space 8 (step US6), and accordingly the virtual device 10 of the kernel space 8 is output. After being closed, the memory 4 is released (step SS4).

On the other hand, when it is confirmed that the processing device 7 is attached when the data processing apparatus 1 is started up, as shown in FIG. 3, data processing by the virtual device 10 of the software as described above (steps SS1 to SS1 in FIG. 2). SS4) is executed by the processing device 7 of the hardware. Furthermore, when a malfunction occurs in the processing device 7 that executes data processing in this way, the data processing is automatically taken over by the virtual device 10.

The data processing apparatus 1 of the present embodiment has the virtual device 10 in the kernel space 8 in the state where the processing device 7 is not attached to the device port 6 as described above.
Since the predetermined data processing is executed by, the dedicated hardware is not required for this data processing. However, if the processing device 7 is attached to the device port 6, the data processing is executed by this processing device 7, so there is no need to execute the data processing by software, and the processing load on the CPU 2 is reduced and the processing speed is improved. Can be made.

Then, the software virtual device 10
Is formed in the same manner as the hardware processing device 7, even when the virtual device 10 is replaced with the processing device 7 as described above, it is not necessary to remodel the operating system and application programs, and simple settings can be made. The device can be switched with a correction level. Therefore, the version upgrade of the data processing device 1 that replaces the virtual device 10 with the processing device 7 can be easily executed. For example, the virtual device 10
It is also possible to easily develop a new data processing device having the processing device 7 from the existing data processing device 1 having the above.

Moreover, when the processing device 7 is not attached to the device port 6, the virtual device 1 is automatically
When the data processing is executed by 0 and the processing device 7 is attached to the device port 6, the data processing is automatically executed by the processing device 7, so that it is not necessary to perform this switching manually. Furthermore, the processing device 7
If a malfunction occurs in the virtual device 10, the data processing is continued by the virtual device 10. Therefore, it is not necessary to perform this switching manually, and the data processing is automatically executed by the optimum device.

Since the virtual device 10 corresponding to the processing device 7 is independently formed in the kernel space 8 as described above, its processing speed can be objectively observed, and the virtual device 10 can be processed. It is also possible to judge whether it is necessary to replace with 7. For example, when the processing device 7 is developed after the virtual device 10 is formed, the processing speeds of the processing device 7 and the virtual device 10 can be compared, and the processing speed of the virtual device 10 is the data processing device 1. It is not necessary to replace it with the processing device 7 if the product level is high enough.

[0027]

According to the invention described in claim 1, since the processing device used for data processing of the application program is provided in the kernel space by software,
Even if a software processing device is replaced with a hardware processing device, it is possible to easily perform a version upgrade or new development in which the processing device is changed from software to hardware without significantly changing the operating system or application program. it can.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, a device port to which a hardware processing device is attached is provided, and attachment detection means for detecting attachment of the processing device to the device port is provided, and an application program corresponding to this detection is provided. When the hardware processing device is mounted on the data processing device that executes the data processing by the software processing device, by providing the device switching means for switching the usage target of the data processing of the software processing device to the hardware processing device. ,
After that, since the data processing is executed by the hardware processing device, it is not necessary to perform this switching manually.

In a third aspect of the present invention, a device switching means is provided which has a device port to which a hardware processing device is attached, and which switches a software processing device from a software processing device to a data processing device of the application program. And a failure detection means for detecting an operation failure of the processing device of the hardware, and in response to this detection, the device switching means targets the application program for data processing from the processing device of the hardware to the software. When a malfunction occurs in the hardware processing device that executes data processing by switching to this processing device, the data processing is taken over by the software processing device, so there is no need to perform this switching manually either. Data processing is performed by the automatic optimal processing device.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a data processing device according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing data processing using a virtual device which is a software processing device.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a processing operation for switching between a virtual device and a hardware processing device.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Data Processing Device 6 Device Port 7 Hardware Processing Device 8 Kernel Space 9 User Space 10 Software Processing Device

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A processing device used in data processing of an application program in a data processing device having a kernel space in which an operating system is preset and a user space in which various application programs are rewritably set. Is provided in the kernel space by software. 2. A device port to which a hardware processing device is attached is provided, and attachment detection means for detecting attachment of the processing device to the device port is provided, and data processing of an application program is used in response to the detection. 2. The data processing apparatus according to claim 1, further comprising device switching means for switching an object from a software processing device to the hardware processing device. 3. A device port to which a hardware processing device is attached is provided, and device switching means is provided for switching a target of data processing of an application program from a software processing device to the hardware processing device. Defect detection means for detecting an operation failure of the processing device, and in response to this detection, the device switching means switches the application program data processing target from the hardware processing device to the software processing device. The data processing device according to claim 1, wherein