to improve the execution performance of a program which makes indirect array reference by performing data prefetching also on an indirect reference array while reducing an instruction overhead , locality in data reference which cannot be detected by a conventional compiler is enabled to be detected by a user instruction or analysis by a compiler on the basis of a tendency that values of indices in an indirect reference array monotonously increase or decrease . by using the information , issuing of redundant prefetch instructions is suppressed , and data prefetching is enabled to be performed also on an indirect reference array .