We had planned for a while to add an 'Overwrite' message which obtains
permissions without requiring retrieval of data. This is useful whenever
a master knows it will completely replace the contents of a cache block.
Instead of calling it Overwrite, we decided to split the Acquire type.
If you AcquirePerm, you MUST Release and ProbeAck with Data.
* CacheCork: an error Grant still says 'toT' even though it is transient
Grants with errors must be handled by a client as though no actual
permissions were obtained, so that two clients do not both end up believing
that they own a block which is only temporarily offline. However, the
Grant MESSAGE should still match the request; ie. if you did Acquire.NtoT,
the response must be Grant.toT, even though the 'error' bit signals that
the Grant actually grants no permissions.
This keeps the implementation of request-response tracking in interstitial
adapters and FSMs simple, consistent with the way multibeat errors must
include all their beats.
* Error: handle permissions properly
When we first implemented TL, we thought this was helpful, because
it made WidthWidgets stateless in all cases. However, it put too
much burden on all other masters and slaves, none of which benefitted
from this signal. Furthermore, even with addr_lo, WidthWidgets were
information lossy because when they widen, they have no information
about what to fill in the new high bits of addr_lo.
Wesley W. Terpstra
Henry Cook