Same person as torpcoms on the Level1Techs forums, RCS Wiki, Github, Reddit, Diaspora (diasp.org server), GNU Social (gnusocial.no server), probably some other places as well.
Consider anything I write to be in the Public Domain and/or CC0.
Timelines for POWER
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The Power ISA evolved from the PowerPC ISA which in turn was an evolution of the POWER ISA used by POWER1 and POWER2 chips.
POWER ISA → PowerPC ISA → Power ISA
When the Power ISA 3.0B specification lists all available instructions, it specifically mentions what version of which architecture introduced the instruction; this gives a fairly quick history of the ISA itself:
| Code | Explanation |
|---|---|
| P1 | Instruction introduced in the POWER Architecture. |
| P2 | Instruction introduced in the POWER2 Architecture. |
| PPC | Instruction introduced in the PowerPC Architecture prior to v2.00. |
| v2.00 | Instruction introduced in the PowerPC Architecture Version 2.00. |
| v2.01 | Instruction introduced in the PowerPC Architecture Version 2.01. |
| v2.02 | Instruction introduced in the PowerPC Architecture Version 2.02. |
| v2.03 | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 2.03. |
| v2.04 | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 2.04. |
| v2.05 | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 2.05. |
| v2.06 | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 2.06. |
| v2.07 | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 2.07. |
| v3.0 | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 3.0. |
| v3.0B | Instruction introduced in the Power ISA Architecture Version 3.0B. |