I believe I've found a copy of this paper, although I haven't had
a chance to look at it yet:

http://www-cse.ucsd.edu/groups/csl/pubs/conf/usenix93.ps

Andy.

John Kohl wrote:
> 
>       Author: Kevin Fall
>       Author: Joseph Pasquale
>        Title: Exploiting In-Kernel Data Paths to Improve I/O Throughput and CPU Availability
>        Pages: 327-333
>    Publisher: USENIX
>  Proceedings: USENIX Technical Conference Proceedings
>         Date: Winter 1993
>     Location: San Diego, CA
>  Institution: University of California, San Diego
> 
> There's no on-line copy at the USENIX library yet.
> Here's the abstract as I have typed it in:
> 
> We present teh motivation, design, implementation, and performance
> evaluation of a UNIX kernel mechanism capable of establishing fast
> in-kernel data pathways between I/O objects.  A new system call,
> splice(), moves data asynchronously and without user-process
> intervention to and from I/O objects specified by file descriptors.
> Performance measurements indicate improved I/O throughput and increased
> CPU availability attributable to data copying and context switch
> overhead.
> 
> --
> ==John Kohl <jtk@rational.com>, Software Engineer
> Rational Software, Configuration Management Business Unit
> Coming soon: Rational User Conference 1999: Seattle WA, July 25--29
> See details and register at <http:/www.rational.com/ruc>