International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.

2, March 2025

DEADLINE-AWARE TASK SCHEDULING STRATEGY

FOR REDUCING NETWORK CONTENTION IN NOC-
BASED MULTICORE SYSTEMS
Mohd Farooq 1, Aasim Zafar 1 and Abdus Samad 2
1
Department of Computer Science, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, India
2
Department of Computer Engineering, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, India

ABSTRACT
Network on Chip (NoC) has revolutionized on-chip communication in multicore systems, establishing itself
as a critical design paradigm for modern multicore processors and System-on-Chip (SoC) architectures. In
contrast to standard bus-based interconnects, NoC employs a network-like structure that enables scalable
and efficient communication between several processing components. This technique has addressed the
issues raised by the rising complexity of integrated circuits, providing higher performance, reduced
latency, and increased power efficiency. NoC has played a critical role in enabling the development of
high-performance computing systems and sophisticated electrical devices by facilitating robust
communication channels between components, marking a substantial shift from earlier interconnect
technologies. Mapping tasks to the Network on Chip (NoC) is a critical challenge in multicore systems, as
it can substantially impact throughput due to communication congestion. Poor mapping decisions can lead
to an increase in total makespan, increase in task missing deadlines, and underutilization of cores. The
proposed algorithm schedules tasks to cores while considering network congestion through various links
and availability of processing elements. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm
improves task deadline satisfaction and minimize makespan by 23.83% and 22.83%, respectively, when
compared to other dynamic task allocation algorithms.

KEYWORDS
Dynamic Scheduling, Network on Chip, Makespan, Multicore, Deadline

1. INTRODUCTION
Multicore systems integrate multiple processing elements (PEs), intellectual property (IP) cores,
and memory units (MUs) onto a singular chip, establishing a high-performance computing
platform. In multicore systems, the Network-on-Chip (NoC) functions as a communication
framework due to its flexibility, reusability, scalability, and parallelism, surpassing the traditional
communication method of bus-based architecture [1], [2]. The NoC communication architecture
consists of network interfaces (NIs), routers, and links. Each core communicates with the router
through a network interface, by converting data into a packet form. The routers are
interconnected through on-chip links, forming the NoC topology [3][4]. The packetized
transmission of data between two processing elements takes place as packets traverse routers,
adhering to a routing policy, across the network links from source to destination cores. Multicore
systems are an integral part of the rapid advancement of modern technology whether in High
Performance Computing, Artificial Intelligence, or Cybersecurity [5], [6].

The main challenges faced in designing of multicore systems is to efficiently use the
computational resources while utilizing less power as possible and find a suitable interconnect

DOI: 10.5121/ijcnc.2025.17202 19
 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025
architecture to connect the available cores to minimize any delay in data transmission. Therefore,
application mapping is an important aspect of efficient utilization of multicore systems [7][8].
The tasks present in an application are mapped according to their dependencies on each other
such that the communicating tasks are mapped to processing cores in vicinity. As the tasks are
dependent on each other, when the execution of a task is completed, it sends data to all its
dependent tasks. Multiple communicating tasks will be sending data through the interconnection
network at the same time. Furthermore, when a network link is taken by a data packet from one
communication traffic, another data packet requiring the same link needs to wait for some time
until the link becomes free. This will lead to high latency or communication delay. For data-
intensive applications high latency will adversely affect the execution efficiency of the
system[9][10]. Therefore, it is highly required to jointly consider the computational load as well
as the communications required for transferring data between different links in a given
application.

Most existing work only considers application mapping to various cores and ignores the
communication between various cores in an NoC [11][12]. In real time dynamic applications,
tasks are submitted randomly to a multicore system. This means that the exact arrival time and
the sequence in which they are arriving of tasks is not known[13][14][15]. In some cases, the
execution time of tasks is also not known prior. For such type of applications, it is very important
to map the tasks according to their communications to reduce the communication latency and
decrease the execution time. All the decisions such as the start time of execution of a task, core
assigned to a task, the time at which the communication will start are taken at runtime. On the
other hand, static approaches are only applicable to a predefined set of tasks having fixed
execution time. But static approaches are unaware of runtime resource variation and cannot be
applied to scenarios having runtime task variation or data transfer through various links in a NoC
[16][17]. Therefore, dynamic task allocation with contention awareness is a challenging task on
multicore systems[18][19]. Along with computation it also considers the communication through
various links in an NoC in case of dynamic scenarios. Most of the previous studies in this field
either allocates the task dynamically and ignores the communication through NoC or focuses
only on communication through NoC ignoring the computational part [20][21]. In this work, we
propose an efficient solution for real-time dynamic task allocation and scheduling while
considering the network contention. The proposed work allocates tasks to various cores
dynamically and also considers the data transfer through various links in an NoC. This algorithm
checks for network contention before each data transfer and chooses the alternate path or an
alternate core in case of network contention. This algorithm reduces the network latency by
reducing the conflicts between data transfers. It decreases the overall execution time due to
changes in the method of selecting the route using the route utilization factor and also leads to a
number of tasks satisfying the deadline. The salient features of the proposed work are:

 This paper proposes a dynamic scheduling algorithm for jointly allocating the tasks to
various cores and scheduling the computational workload through various links and NoC
-based multicore system.
 It provides an online method that takes into account the future traffic using the route
utilization factor and dynamically chooses a route for data packets between the links.
 It proposes an improved heuristic method to dynamically allocate tasks leading to a
reduction in overall execution time, improved deadline performance and reduced network
latency.
 The proposed method ensures optimal task allocation and effective network utilization of
the NoC architectures, making it a viable solution for real-time dynamic scheduling in
multicore systems.

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The remainder of this paper is organized as follows: the related work is discussed in Section 2.
The system model considered for this work is explained in Section 3. The proposed dynamic
algorithm is explained in Section 4. The experimental results obtained from the proposed
algorithm are compared to other dynamic algorithms in Section 5. Finally, Section 6 presents the
concluding remarks.

2. RELATED WORK
A dynamic mapping algorithm Minimum Maximum Channel Load(MMCL) was proposed in
[22]. This heuristic calculates the channel load for all possible mappings for any new task
inserted in the system. Its main aim is to minimize channel usage which has a high value of
channel load. Since MMCL considers all NoC channels before allocating a task. Another
dynamic mapping heuristic Path Load (PL) was also proposed in [22]. This heuristic only
considers only those link segments which will be used by the task under mapping. It chooses the
path with a minimum value of Path Load. The path load algorithm only considers the traffic on
the path but does not consider the load on the processing cores.

In Communication Aware Nearest Neighbor (CA-NN) [23], the parent task is mapped at the
center of the cluster of processing elements. For all the unmapped tasks, a basic ordered list of
processing elements is formed for every task. The basic ordered list is formed in a top, down, left
right manner. The processing elements are searched in increasing order of hop counts. If a
suitable processing element is not found in 1 hop count, it is searched at 2 hop count. If the
selected task can be run on the processing element, then the previously mapped tasks on that
processing element are found. Then it is checked whether any of the previously mapped tasks on
the processing element is the parent of the selected task. If a selected task's parent is found, it is
mapped on the processing element. Otherwise, the next processing element is checked so that the
current processing element can have the child task of the currently allocated tasks. If the selected
task has no parent task, it is allocated at the first suitable processing element. Resources are
updated after every mapping so that the other future tasks can have accurate information about
the task's mapping. CA-NN can be used in static as well as dynamic scenarios, In CA-NN a
processing element can execute more than one task. It depends on the maximum capacity of the
processing element. It is a communication-aware heuristic because it searches for communication
with a parent task while allocating a new task to a processing element. CA-NN can execute more
number of tasks than the processing cores. However, in this algorithm two tasks can send data
through a link at the same time leading to network congestion. This algorithm also does not
consider task deadlines leading to deadline violation.

Another dynamic task scheduling strategy was proposed in [24]. This method involves the
implementation of a management unit employing the method of trellis search to identify the paths
with reduced contention and lowering the communication latency between the source and
destination tiles within a network-on-chip. It searches for a suitable tile in all directions
simultaneously like flooding, resulting in faster searching speed as compared to previous similar
methods. This method incorporates a hardware-based allocation manager to guarantee lower
latency and enhance the mapping speed. However, this strategy introduces an additional overhead
of hardware implementation.

In another similar approach the Smart Hill Climbing Algorithm[25], the authors employed a
simplified algorithm to identify an appropriate location for a given application. The authors
modified the process of selecting the initial processing core/node by incorporating the method of
square factor. This square factor plays a crucial role in determining the number of adjacent nodes,
forming nearly square shapes that surround the initial node. The dynamic task mapping strategy
tries to choose a minimal mapping distance or identify a continuous region for traffic to reduce
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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025
communication latency. In the context of real-time mapping scenarios, however, it becomes
impractical to allocate all tasks using this algorithm.

A dynamic task mapping algorithm with congestion speculation (DTMCS) was proposed in [26].
This algorithm only executes an application if the number of tasks in an application is lesser than
the number of number of tiles in a NoC architecture. Otherwise, it rejects an application. At the
start, all tasks are placed in a ready queue using BFS. It starts by mapping the parent task to the
first available tile. The initial execution occurs on the first tile with the parent task of an
application. Subsequently, the child tasks of the executed parent task are selected sequentially for
execution. The destination tile for each child task is determined using Manhattan Distance,
starting from the lowest value. Once a suitable destination tile is found, the communication edge
is assigned to the connecting links between the source and destination tiles. The Speculation
Time Window (STW) is updated following each data transfer through a link. Speculation Time
Window (STW) values serve as a means to avoid network contention. When a tile intends to
transmit data via a link, the STW values of the link are compared with the current link usage. In
the presence of network contention, the sending tile is required to wait for a specific duration
determined by the intersection of STW values and the current link usage. Data is then transmitted
through the route with minimal or zero route utilization. This entire process is applied to all
traffic destined for the target tile. DTMCS is developed to be applied to dynamic scenarios only.
This algorithm increases the idle time of cores because only a single task can be allocated to a
processing core.

An improved throttle algorithm was proposed in [27]. This algorithm improved the throttle
algorithm which was based on dynamic load balancing by maintaining a configuration table of
available processing units and updating the list regularly after each task allocation. The
disadvantage of this algorithm is that it needs to scan all the processing units before allocating a
task and it leads to significant delays in task processing. It is also not effective if the processing
units that are available for executing tasks are present at the bottom of that configuration table.

In [28], the authors introduced a Dynamic Task Scheduling Algorithm (DTSCA) for multicore
systems where the issues of network contention and deadline satisfaction are both taken into
account. This parent task of an application is allotted to the tile having maximum free neighbors.
The child tasks of the task executed by the tile are then inserted in the ready queue. Then a child
task is selected from the ready queue based on minimum slack time. After this, a suitable tile is
chosen for the execution of the child task using the Manhattan Distance. Then it calculates the
Link Utilization Factor (LUF) for all the links in the path between the source tile and destination
tile. It then averages all values of LUF in the routs to get the Route Utilization Factor (RUF). It
selects a tile if there is no link contention. Their approach checks for network contention for a
link only once and then transmits the data at the next available cycle. Averaging all values of
LUF to get RUF, leads to inaccurate wait time for a task. Therefore, the authors did not address
the issue of network contention iteratively. This algorithm also waits for a higher amount of time
at each network contention. If route is available then this algorithms does not check for the
availability of the processing core, leading to an increase in waiting time for tasks.

In our previous work[29], we proposed an algorithm as an extension of the DTSCA algorithm

which check the contention iteratively and improves the communication delay only. The
algorithm parameters such as LUF and RUF were calculated according to the DTSCA algorithm.
The other limitation of this work is that it was limited to quadcore systems only. In comparison to
that, in this work, we proposed a new method to calculate the link utility factor, route utility
factor, checked for network contention iteratively also added the feature of checking the
availability of tile at any instant to reduce the average waiting time for tasks. This algorithm
improves overall makespan, reduces the number of tasks missing deadlines as added features

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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025
along with minimizing network contention. This method is applied on multicore systems with
varying the number of cores from 6X6 to 18X18.
3. SYSTEM MODEL
In our model, we considered a multicore system which is based on tiles. A multicore system
consists of multiple tiles. Each tile contains a processing core, router, and network interface (NI).
The processing cores are homogeneous in nature and the same architectural configuration. The
communication architecture used to connect tiles is NoC. In this approach, we used 2D mesh
NoC. Links are connections between tiles. Figure 1 shows the basic model of mesh NoC
architecture.

Figure 1: Basic structure of a 6X6 NoC architecture

The tasks assigned to a tile are executed by the processing core. It is assumed that all the cores
are homogeneous in nature. Data from the processing core is sent to the network via a network
interface, where it is transformed into packet format and injected into the router. The router uses
a routing algorithm to guide the data packets from the source to the destination. In the routing
algorithm, two policies are employed to direct data packets. Initially, a route is determined using
the XY routing policy. If the determined route is occupied, an alternative route is determined
through the YX routing policy. If both routes are occupied, the transmitting router must delay the
sending of data until one of the routes becomes free. Upon identifying a suitable route, packets
are dispatched through the links connecting the source and destination tiles.

In our study, we considered a single manager tile responsible for hosting the operating system.
We assumed that the OS supports non pre-emptive execution of tasks. This manager tile
implements the scheduling algorithm and identifies the optimal tile for task execution. Incoming
tasks in the system are mapped to the most suitable tiles by the managerial tile. The cores within
each tile carry out task execution, transmitting the results to child tasks either within the same tile
or across different tiles. All cores maintain complete control over executing the assigned tasks
and transmitting the outcomes that generate at the end of task completion.

Application Task Graph: It is a directed acyclic graph (DAG) that comprises of a collection of
tasks and edges. Each task is characterized by an execution time and a deadline, represented as
ti(exei, dli). The edges in the graph are denoted by ei(ts, td, ew), where ts, td, and ew indicate the
source tile, destination tile, and edge weight, respectively.

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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025
NoC Topology: The NoC topology comprises of an n*n network of tiles interconnected through
various communication links. Every tile has an earliest available time, which is updated upon
task completion on that tile. Routing policies establish a route R, where |R| indicates the length of
a particular route, i.e., the total number of links present in a route. Contention is examined for
each link at a specific time instant, and packets are transmitted once the communicating link
becomes available. All the system model requirements are detailed in Table 1.

Table 1: System Model Requirements

Parameters Values/Ranges
Topology Mesh
Core Type Homogeneous
Clock Speed of Core 1GHz – 3.5 GHz

The various terms used in the proposed algorithm are described below:
Link Utilization Window (LUW) for each link on the communication path is calculated using the
formula provided in equation 1:

(1)

where,v represents the initiation time of communication, i.e. the instant at which the parent task
has finished its execution.

ew represents the weight of the edge between the parent and child task
Link Utilization Factor (LUF) for each link in the path is calculated using the formula provided in
equation 2:

LUFa,b = number of elements (LUWa,b ⋂Z a,b ) (2)

where, Za,b signifies the time intervals during which a specific link (from tile a to tile b) is in use.
Value of Z is updated at the start of data transmission when link is found to be free, so that the
other tiles can check for contention.

Route Utilization Factor (RUF) for each link in the path is calculated using the formula provided
in equation 3:

RUF = Maximum (LUFs for all links in the path) (3)

RUF gives the value of minimum amount of time to wait in case if the link is used by some other
task for data transfer. If we take the average value of all the LUFs (LUF of all links in the path),
this will give an inaccurate value of wait time which will ultimately leads to congestion.

4. THE PROPOSED ALGORITHM

The proposed dynamic task allocation and scheduling strategy allocates tasks to various cores
dynamically and then maps the various data transfers through different links by selecting a route
dynamically to minimize network contention. Our proposed scheduling algorithm uses the best
route in comparison to the previous DTSCA algorithm which reduces the overall latency. The
tasks are dynamic in nature. The number of tasks is not fixed and can change at runtime. The
arrival timings of tasks are also not known prior.

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The proposed algorithm is given in two phases as described below:

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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025

RLCAS
Input: Graph(tasks, edges), hop, mesh_size
Output: Task to tile allocation and communicating edge allocation to links

task_scheduled = null;
task_tile_allocation = null;
𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 ← null;
𝐸𝑑𝑔𝑒_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 ← null;
𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑜𝑡 = root task of 𝐺raph;
𝑡𝑙𝑟𝑜𝑜𝑡 = tile surrounded by the highest count of unoccupied neighboring tiles;
assign tlroot to task troot;
update task_tile_allocation;
𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 ← child tasks of 𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑜𝑡;
𝐸𝑑𝑔𝑒_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 ← Edges arriving at tasks in the 𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡;
update Task_Tile_Allocation;
while 𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 OR 𝐸𝑑𝑔𝑒_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 != NULL do
𝑡𝑠𝑒𝑙 = 𝑚𝑖𝑛_𝑑𝑙(𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡) ;
𝑡_parents = parents of 𝑡𝑠𝑒𝑙;
t_children = children of 𝑡𝑠𝑒𝑙;
t_parent = Check for multiple parents and choose the one which completed latest.
for each t_child in t_children
if (all parent tasks of t_child scheduled)
𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡 = [𝑅𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦_𝑙𝑖𝑠𝑡, t_child];
end
end

(𝑡𝑙𝑋𝑌, R𝑋𝑌, RUFXY, LUW) = 𝐷𝑅𝑆𝑇𝐶 (𝑡𝑙𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡, 𝑡𝑠𝑒𝑙, 𝐸𝑠𝑒𝑙, ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑡, 𝑋𝑌 𝑅𝑜𝑢𝑡𝑒𝑃 𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑐𝑦);
if (RUFXY == 0) then
Update EATTl (𝑡𝑙𝑋𝑌);
Update TaskTileAlloc;
Update Z using LUW;
else
(𝑡𝑙𝑌𝑋, R𝑌X, RUFYX, LUW) = 𝐷𝑅𝑆𝑇𝐶 (𝑡𝑙𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑛𝑡, 𝑡𝑠𝑒𝑙, 𝐸𝑠𝑒𝑙, ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑡, 𝑋𝑌 𝑅𝑜𝑢𝑡𝑒𝑃 𝑜𝑙𝑖𝑐𝑦);
If (RUFYX == 0)
Update EATTl (𝑡𝑙𝑌𝑋);
Update TaskTileAlloc;
Update Z using LUW;
else
max1 = max (EATTl (𝑡𝑙𝑋𝑌), EAT(path));
max2 = max (EATTl (𝑡𝑙𝑋𝑌), EAT(path));
if (max1 <= max2) then
Update EATTl (𝑡𝑙𝑋𝑌);
Update TaskTileAlloc;
Update Z using LUW;
else
Update EATTl (𝑡𝑙𝑋𝑌);
Update TaskTileAlloc;
Update Z using LUW;
end
end
end
update Readylist;
update Edgelist;
allocateroutes(send data to child tile from all other parents);
endwhile

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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025

DSRTC
Input: phi, tsel, edge_sel, tlparent, hop, routing policy, task graph, mesh
Output: tlselected, best_route, updated_LOW_values, RUF, start_time

all_tiles = all tiles having hop count less than hop from tlparent;
Sort and shuffled tiles of same order in all_tiles;

for i = 1 to all_tiles
tlselected = ith_tile;
if (XYRoutingpolicy)
Route_R = findroute (tlselected, tlparent, mesh, XYRoutePolicy);
else
Route_R = findroute (tlselected, tlparent, mesh, YXRoutePolicy);
end
for each link in R
calculate LUW and then LUF;
end
RUF = maximum (All LUFs in route R);
if (RUF = 0 && EAT(tlselected) = 0)
return (tlselected, LOW, RUF, R);

elseif (RUF = 0 && EAT(tlselected)! = 0)

high_value = max (EAT(tlselected), max(LOW));
start_time = high_value;
update (tlselected, LUW, RUF);
else
update the LUW values according to contention details;
update modified LUW values;
update start_time;
update (tlselected, LUW, RUF, start_time);
end
endfor
return(tlselected, LUW, RUF, start_time, R);

where,
EAT = Earliest Available time.
EATTl = Earliest Available time of tile.
tlselected = Tile Selected.
tlparent = Tile on which parent task is executed.

The first phase is defined as RLCAS. In this phase, the main inputs given are the task graph, hop
size and the mesh size. The output it gives are allocating of task to various tiles and data transfer
through various links. At the start of the algorithm there is an initialization phase. In this phase
three list are defined the Ready_List, Edge_List and Task_Tile_Allocation list. The Ready_List
and Edge_List are updated after every iteration of while loop. All the task whose parents have
completed execution are added to Ready_List after the completion of each iteration. All the
communicating edges are added to Edge_List after the addition of task to Ready_List.
Task_Tile_Allocation list contains the various tasks which have completed execution and the
tiles assigned to them.

In the first algorithm (RLCAS) root task of the task graph of an application is assigned to the tile
having maximum free tiles in the vicinity. Here allocation of task to the tile indicates allocating
the task to the processing core of a tile. Then the Ready_List is updated with all the tasks which
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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025
are the child tasks of the executed task and only those tasks are added in the Ready_List whose
all parent tasks are executed. If a task has more than one parent task, then it will only be inserted
in the Ready_List after the execution of all the parents. The Edge_List is updated with all the
communicating edges to the tasks which are present in the Ready_List. The
Task_Tile_Allocation list is updated with the root task and the root tile.

After this the while loop starts execution and it executes till either the Ready_List or the
Edge_List becomes empty. If one of the list becomes empty, it just allocates the remaining tasks
or the remaining edges to the available tiles or links. In the loop, the first step is to select a task
for execution. A task tsel is selected from the Ready_List for execution having the closest
deadline. Next step is to search for the best parent task for the task selected. It is selected on the
basis of communicating edges. The parent task having the most amount of communication with
the Tsel is selected as parent task out of all the parent tasks available. The selected task tsel is
executed on the tile which is closest to tile executing the parent tile for minimum delay in the
network communication. Then the DSRTC function is called for finding a suitable tile for the
selected task tsel using the XY routing policy. If RUF of the route comes out to be zero and the
tile is available for execution, then it is executed on the tile given by DSRTC function and all the
value like Z, EAT(Tl), Task_Tile_Allocation are updated accordingly. Otherwise an alternate tile
is searched using YX routing policy. If the value of RUF is 0 in this case, then the alternate tile is
selected for execution and value are updated accordingly. If RUF is not 0 for any tile in given hop
count, it selects the tile with the min start time for execution using both routing policies. After
selecting a tile, it updates Z values using LUW values, EAT(Tl), and Task_Tile_Allocation
accordingly. Then at the last the Ready_List, Edge_List are updated with new tasks whose all
parents have got executed and the corresponding edges. Allocate routes function is used to update
all the incoming edges to the selected task tsel other than the parent one.

In the second phase, DSRTC function is given. This function is called from RLCAS function to
get the best tile for implementing a task. It takes input all the basic requirements as input such as
hop count, routing policy, tlparent, edge, phi, etc. The output it gives are best tile for child task,
RUF, LUF, Route_R, start_time for the selected task.

This function starts by sorting the tiles in increasing order of hop count from the parent tile. If
many tiles have same hop count it shuffles them between each other so they get picked randomly.
Then it picks a tile from the sorted list starting with the lowest hop count. The next step is to find
a route R using the given routing policy. Then for each link in the route R, it calculates the Link
Utilization Window (LUW). LUW values are used to calculate Link Utilization Factor (LUF) for
each link in the route. Using LUW values, we get the Route Utilization Factor (RUF). In our
work, we took the maximum value of the LUF values of all links in the route. We took the
maximum value of all the LUF because it gives the maximum contention in the link. If waited for
this amount of time and checked again, the link might be available.

After this if the value of RUF comes out to be zero for any link and tile is also available then the
selected tile is used for execution of current task. Otherwise, if RUF is zero and earliest available
time of tile is less than the current time, then also the current tile is selected for execution.
Otherwise if RUF is not zero and there is a contention in the link then the LUW values of link is
updated according to the amount of contention and its LUF values are updated accordingly. It
updates a new start time for the task which does not contain link congestion. Or if the EAT of tile
is more than the present time only the start time is updated accordingly and is sent back to the
calling function. Then at last, it returns all the parameters required by RLCAS function.

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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025

5. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

This section presents the outcomes derived from assessing the effectiveness of the proposed
contention-based dynamic task mapping and scheduling approach. In this section, we evaluated
the performance of the proposed algorithm. The results of the proposed algorithm are compared
with the recently developed DTSCA algorithm and standard CA-NN algorithm. To evaluate the
performance of the suggested scheduler, we conducted simulations using MATLAB on a
multicore system with an Hp Omen Ryzen 5 4600H processor. Task graphs are random and are
obtained from the standard tool TGFF [30]. The simulation parameters used in the experiment
along with their corresponding values/ranges are given in Table 2. To ensure the reliability of our
results and minimize potential biases, we have carefully designed our data collection approach.
The task graphs used in our experiments were generated using TGFF, a widely accepted
benchmark tool for the task graph generation. Additionally, we conducted multiple trials across
different NoC configurations to validate consistency in results.

We adopted a systematic approach to data collection. Our experiments involved allocating

different application task graphs to different NoC architectures, ensuring a diverse range of test
scenarios. Specifically, we allocated 10 different applications, each containing 60 tasks, to NoC
architectures ranging from 6×6 to 18×18 to analyze deadline performance and makespan. At last,
we averaged the results obtained from all iterations to get our result. In a single iteration, we have
applied the same task graph to all architectures to get results, this removes any form of bias.
Additionally, we conducted a separate experiment with 20 applications, each containing 30 tasks,
to assess scalability. Therefore, our approach remains robust and reliable within an acceptable
tolerance level, providing meaningful insights into the impact of dynamic scheduling strategies
on NoC-based multicore systems.

The results obtained are compared with the latest DTSCA algorithm and the standard CA-NN
algorithm on the parameters deadline performance, total makespan and scalability of the
proposed algorithm.

Table 2: Simulation parameters used for experiment and their values

Parameters Values/Ranges
Task Count [20,100]
Number of Task Graphs 100
Task In degree [0, 10]
Task Out degree [0, 10]
Multicore Architecture Mesh

5.1. Deadline Performance

In this subsection, results of deadline performance of the proposed algorithm are compared with
the other two dynamic strategies CA-NN and DTSCA. In this experiment, we also allocated 10
different applications containing 60 tasks to the varying NoC architectures. We varied the NoC
size from 6X6 to 18X18. The results obtained after comparison are shown in Figure 2. We
observed that the percentage of tasks meeting deadline increases by 10.84% and 36.82% as
compared to DTSCA and CA-NN algorithms. The increase in deadline performance is due to
reduced network contention which will lead to more delay in execution of tasks. As latency while
transferring of data decreases, therefore the proposed algorithm performs better than other two
dynamic strategies in case of deadline performance. On the other hand CA-NN approach attempts

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to allocate tiles to task by using the communication data between tasks but this approach results
in link congestion when data from two tasks are sent through the same link. CA-NN approach
does not checks for availability of route while transferring data which will lead to network
congestion. Therefore the proposed dynamic strategy leads to more tasks meeting the deadlines
as compared to other two strategies.

It can also be seen that numbers of tasks meeting the deadline increase as we increase the size of
NoC architecture. This is because more free tiles are available to execute tasks leading to less
delay in execution of tasks.

Figure 2: Comparison of deadline performance with varying Platform Size

5.2. Total Makespan

In this subsection, the results of the makespan of the proposed algorithm are evaluated. The
results of the proposed algorithm are compared with the recently developed the DTSCA
algorithm and the standard CA-NN algorithm. In our experimental setup, we varied the platform
size from 6X6 to 18X18. We allocated 10 different applications each containing 60 tasks to all
platform sizes and obtained the results of makespan. The results obtained are depicted in Figure
3. On an average, the proposed algorithm performs 15.65% faster than DTSCA algorithm and
36.43% faster than the standard CA-NN algorithm. While allocating a tile to a task, the proposed
algorithm also checks for availability of the tile if the route is available. The proposed method
checks for earliest available time of the tile and finds an alternate tile in case if the child tile is not
available. While DTSCA allocate the task to a tile if the route utility factor comes out to be zero.
It does not checks for the availability of destination tile. If the tile is busy this will lead to
increase in waiting time for that task. This will lead to increase in overall makespan. The
algorithm proposed in this study takes into account the timing characteristics of tasks and the
utilization of their corresponding links. It aims to select an appropriate tile in close proximity to
the parent task. This algorithm also uses a better estimate of route utility factor in comparison to
other dynamic algorithms, so this also leads to less congestion in links, which ultimately leads to
lower makespan. These considerations collectively contribute to minimizing the completion time
of the mapped task, allowing for low-delay scheduling of subsequent child tasks. Consequently,

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 International Journal of Computer Networks & Communications (IJCNC) Vol.17, No.2, March 2025
the proposed method significantly reduces the makespan of allocated applications when
compared to other two dynamic strategies.

Figure 3: Comparison of Execution Time with varying Platform Size

5.3. Scalability of the Proposed Approach

This section presents the results of the scalability of the proposed approach with an increase in
size of NoC architecture. We allocated 20 different applications with 30 tasks each to different
NoC architectures. We used the timeit() function in Matlab to get the time taken by the algorithm
to allocate all the tasks to tiles. The total time taken by 20 applications for scheduling the tasks is
then divided by a total number of applications to get the average time for allocating an
application. The results obtained are normalized with respect to the CA-NN algorithm at that
architecture and it serves as a baseline for comparison. The results obtained are shown in Figure
4. The results on an average shows increase in 11.45% and 34.21% increase in timing overhead
as compared to CA-NN and DTSCA algorithms. The results show an increase in timing overhead
with increase in size of NoC architecture. The proposed algorithm show an increase in timing
overhead due to increase in the number of tiles for higher NoC architectures. As it checks for
extra links for link contention and it also checks for availability of tile, hence, the timing
overhead increases. But it can be seen from the results, the proposed algorithm only shows a
25.26% increase in timing overhead as the number of tiles varies from 6X6 to 18X18, which is
considerably low as compared to the increase in the number of tiles from 36 to 324(9 times).

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Figure 4: Comparison of Normalized (Runtime) of algorithm with varying Platform Size

6. CONCLUSION
In this study, we proposed an enhanced methodology for dynamic task allocation and scheduling
in NoC-based multicore systems with contention-awareness. Our proposed algorithm takes into
account the link utilization of the target multicore platform when determining the appropriate
processing core for task execution. It calculates the route utility factor in an efficient way to
further reduce link congestion. In real-time applications, it dynamically chooses a route to
alleviate network contention during the data transfer from one tile to another. It also checks for
the availability of tiles to reduce the overall makespan. To assess the effectiveness of our runtime
algorithm, we conducted a comparative analysis with other dynamic task and communication
mapping and scheduling algorithms found in the literature. The results obtained highlight the
efficacy of our approach in terms of meeting deadlines and minimizing the makespan for the
scheduled applications. The proposed method increases the number of tasks meeting the deadline
by approximately 23.83%. It also reduces the overall makespan by 22.83%. It is also scalable as
the total runtime of the algorithm only increases by 25.26% when the NoC architecture changes
from 6X6 to 18X18. Therefore, this strategy results in better deadline performance and reduced
makespan leading to improved performance in NoC based multicore systems. This strategy is
also well-suited for the simultaneous allocation and scheduling of computation and
communication workloads for NoC-based multicore systems.

Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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AUTHORS
Mohd Farooq is a research scholar in the Department of Computer Science at Aligarh
Muslim University, Aligarh, India. He completed his master’s degree (MCA) from
Aligarh Muslim University in 2017. His research areas include Parallel and Distributed
Systems, Multicore Processors, and NoC Systems. He has contributed to and attended
various national and international conferences.

Dr. Aasim Zafar is a Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Aligarh

Muslim University, India. He has contributed extensively to national and international
conferences and has published research in renowned journals. His academic interests
and research areas encompass Mobile Ad Hoc and Sensor Networks, Software
Engineering, Information Retrieval, E-Systems, Cybersecurity, Virtual Learning
Environments, Neuro-Fuzzy Systems, Soft Computing, Knowledge Management
Systems, Network-on-Chip (NoC) architectures, and Web Mining.

Dr. Abdus Samad is an Associate Professor in Department of Computer Engineering,

ZHCET, at Aligarh Muslim University, India. His research interests include Parallel and
Distributed Systems, Algorithm Design, Microprocessor Design, and Parallel System
Design. With over 22 years of teaching experience, he continues to contribute
significantly to his field.

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