An apparatus and method are disclosed for implementing the system architectural requirement of precise interrupt reporting in a pipelined processor with multiple functional units. Since the expense of an interrupt pipeline is warranted only for those interrupts that occur frequently - specifically, those arising from virtual memory management - the apparatus utilizes an interrupt pipeline for frequently occurring interrupts, and a slower, but much less costly, software-based system for precisely reporting the remaining interrupts. The software-based system is facilitated by an instruction numbering and tracing scheme, whereby pertinent information concerning executed instructions is recorded as the instructions pass through the processor pipeline and potentially to other functional units. A software interrupt handler may use this information to isolate and precisely report an interrupt.
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