Disassembling an executable to analyse function calls to minimise cache misses

摘要

Several object files 104, each containing functions, are linked to produce an executable 106. The executable is disassembled by an optimiser 117 to identify function calls from one object file to another. The number of cache misses caused by the function calls between modules may be analysed to produce a report 107. The order of the object files is altered so that the distance of function calls between object files is minimised and a new linker script 105 is produced. The object files are then re-linked using the new script. The functions may be given priorities and the call distances of high priority functions may be considered before those of low priority functions. The priorities may be user assigned, determined by the type of memory from which the function is fetched or based on the number of times the function is called.