Privilege Levels, Execution Modes, and Delegation Boundaries: Step-by-Step Walkthrough

Step-by-step walkthrough

Step-by-Step Walkthrough for Privilege Levels, Execution Modes, and Delegation Boundaries is anchored on Privilege-transition latency and number of unauthorized accesses blocked by PMP/page-permission checks per billion instructions.. Convert observations into mechanism-backed decisions with explicit ownership.

1. Define failing workload and acceptance threshold.

2. Capture reproducible metadata and evidence snapshot.

3. Classify dominant mechanism path.

4. Propose minimal reversible change.

5. Validate cross-workload and corner behavior.

6. Document owner and rollout decision.

Reference path

RISC-V PIPELINE DIAGRAM - Privilege Levels, Execution Modes, and Delegation Boundaries

PC -> IF -> ID -> EX -> MEM -> WB
      |     |      |      |      |
  i-cache decode  ALU/BR  LSU    regfile write
              \   |
               +-> branch resolve + redirect

Hot paths:
  - branch + load-use dependencies in ID/EX
  - memory latency stretching MEM stage
  - writeback arbitration for integer/vector units

Focus: keep control hazards predictable