:cycle of reincarnation: [coined by Ivan Sutherland ca. 1970] n.
Term used to refer to a well-known effect whereby function in a
computing system family is migrated out to special-purpose
peripheral hardware for speed, then the peripheral evolves toward
more computing power as it does its job, then somebody notices that
it is inefficient to support two asymmetrical processors in the
architecture and folds the function back into the main CPU, at
which point the cycle begins again. Several iterations of this
cycle have been observed in graphics-processor design, and at least
one or two in communications and floating-point processors. Also
known as `the Wheel of Life', `the Wheel of Samsara', and other
variations of the basic Hindu/Buddhist theological idea. See also
{blitter}, {bit bang}.
-- The AI Hackers Dictionary
Term used to refer to a well-known effect whereby function in a
computing system family is migrated out to special-purpose
peripheral hardware for speed, then the peripheral evolves toward
more computing power as it does its job, then somebody notices that
it is inefficient to support two asymmetrical processors in the
architecture and folds the function back into the main CPU, at
which point the cycle begins again. Several iterations of this
cycle have been observed in graphics-processor design, and at least
one or two in communications and floating-point processors. Also
known as `the Wheel of Life', `the Wheel of Samsara', and other
variations of the basic Hindu/Buddhist theological idea. See also
{blitter}, {bit bang}.
-- The AI Hackers Dictionary
Related:
- wheel of reincarnation
[coined in a paper by T.
H. Myer and I.E. Sutherland "On the Design of Display... - blitter: /blit'r/ n. A special-purpose chip or hardware system
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esp. used for fast implementation of bit-mapped... - blitter /blit'r/ n.
[common] A special-purpose chip
or hardware system built to perform blit operations,
esp. used for fast implementation of bit-mapped... - reincarnation, cycle of: n. See {cycle of reincarnation}.
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--
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