Patent attributes
A compiler-created cache contains target addresses of multiple indirect routine call sites. Ordinals assigned to indirect routine call sites are used with hardcoded offsets into the cache. Ordinals may be computed using a routine counter and an indirect call site counter. At runtime a target address of an indirect routine call site is compared to an entry in the cache using the hardcoded offset for efficiency. If the target address matches the cache entry, then a redundant call is avoided; otherwise, the call is not redundant, and the cache is updated. The call tested for redundancy may be a security check for malware, or a computationally expensive routine which calculates a return value without any side effects. Stack pointer validity may be checked. The cache may be guarded with code for trustworthy computing. Tail merging may be performed.
