[Qemu-devel] Time complexity for self-modifying code

[Michael Gagnon]

Hello.  I'm a student at George Mason University and I had a question 
regarding the time complexity of QEMU's algorithm for dealing with 
self-modifying code. 

From looking at the QEMU Internals documentation 
(http://fabrice.bellard.free.fr/qemu/qemu-tech.html), it seems that 
QEMU's method for handling self-modifying code might have different 
algorithmic efficiency classes for it's average case and worst case.  As 
in, on average I assume that QEMU emulates instructions at O(n) 
efficiency.  In the worst-case, might self-modifying code change the 
efficiency of QEMU to another order of efficiency, such as O(n^2)?  Any 
thoughts would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks!

Mike Gagnon
http://www.mikegagnon.com