Snooping Protocol

Definition - What does Snooping Protocol mean?

Snooping protocol ensures memory cache coherency in symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) systems. Each processor cache on a bus monitors, or snoops, the bus to verify whether it has a copy of a requested data block. Before a processor writes data, other processor cache copies must be invalidated or updated. Snooping protocol is also known as bus-snooping protocol.

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Techopedia explains Snooping Protocol

The two snooping protocol types are: Write-Invalidate: Before changing its copy, a data-writing processor invalidates copies of data in all other system processor caches. This action is communicated by an invalidation signal sent over the bus. Write-Update: A data-writing processor announces new data through the bus. All affected caches are updated with the new data.