Processes and Their Scheduling Multiprocessor Scheduling Threads Distributed Scheduling/migration
Uploaded by
MANOJ MProcesses and Their Scheduling Multiprocessor Scheduling Threads Distributed Scheduling/migration
Uploaded by
MANOJ MProcesses and Threads
Processes and their scheduling
Multiprocessor scheduling
Threads
Distributed Scheduling/migration
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 1
Processes: Review
Multiprogramming versus multiprocessing
Kernel data structure: process control block (PCB)
Each process has an address space
Contains code, global and local variables..
Process state transitions
Uniprocessor scheduling algorithms
Round-robin, shortest job first, FIFO, lottery scheduling, EDF
Performance metrics: throughput, CPU utilization,
turnaround time, response time, fairness
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 2
Process Behavior
Processes: alternate between CPU and I/O
CPU bursts
Most bursts are short, a few are very long (high variance)
Modeled using hyperexponential behavior
If X is an exponential r.v.
Pr [ X <= x] = 1 e-x
E[X] = 1/
If X is a hyperexponential r.v.
Pr [X <= x] = 1 p e-x -(1-p) e-x
E[X] = p/ p)/
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 3
Process Scheduling
Priority queues: multiples queues, each with a different
priority
Use strict priority scheduling
Example: page swapper, kernel tasks, real-time tasks, user tasks
Multi-level feedback queue
Multiple queues with priority
Processes dynamically move from one queue to another
Depending on priority/CPU characteristics
Gives higher priority to I/O bound or interactive tasks
Lower priority to CPU bound tasks
Round robin at each level
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 4
Processes and Threads
Traditional process
One thread of control through a large, potentially sparse address
space
Address space may be shared with other processes (shared mem)
Collection of systems resources (files, semaphores)
Thread (light weight process)
A flow of control through an address space
Each address space can have multiple concurrent control flows
Each thread has access to entire address space
Potentially parallel execution, minimal state (low overheads)
May need synchronization to control access to shared variables
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 5
Threads
Each thread has its own stack, PC, registers
Share address space, files,
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 6
Why use Threads?
Large multiprocessors need many computing entities
(one per CPU)
Switching between processes incurs high overhead
With threads, an application can avoid per-process
overheads
Thread creation, deletion, switching cheaper than processes
Threads have full access to address space (easy sharing)
Threads can execute in parallel on multiprocessors
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 7
Why Threads?
Single threaded process: blocking system calls, no
parallelism
Finite-state machine [event-based]: non-blocking with
parallelism
Multi-threaded process: blocking system calls with
parallelism
Threads retain the idea of sequential processes with
blocking system calls, and yet achieve parallelism
Software engineering perspective
Applications are easier to structure as a collection of threads
Each thread performs several [mostly independent] tasks
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 8
Multi-threaded Clients Example :
Web Browsers
Browsers such as IE are multi-threaded
Such browsers can display data before entire document
is downloaded: performs multiple simultaneous tasks
Fetch main HTML page, activate separate threads for other
parts
Each thread sets up a separate connection with the server
Uses blocking calls
Each part (gif image) fetched separately and in parallel
Advantage: connections can be setup to different sources
Ad server, image server, web server
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 9
Multi-threaded Server Example
Apache web server: pool of pre-spawned worker threads
Dispatcher thread waits for requests
For each request, choose an idle worker thread
Worker thread uses blocking system calls to service web
request
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 10
Thread Management
Creation and deletion of threads
Static versus dynamic
Critical sections
Synchronization primitives: blocking, spin-lock (busy-wait)
Condition variables
Global thread variables
Kernel versus user-level threads
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 11
User-level versus kernel threads
Key issues:
Cost of thread management
More efficient in user space
Ease of scheduling
Flexibility: many parallel programming models and
schedulers
Process blocking a potential problem
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 12
User-level Threads
Threads managed by a threads library
Kernel is unaware of presence of threads
Advantages:
No kernel modifications needed to support threads
Efficient: creation/deletion/switches dont need system calls
Flexibility in scheduling: library can use different scheduling
algorithms, can be application dependent
Disadvantages
Need to avoid blocking system calls [all threads block]
Threads compete for one another
Does not take advantage of multiprocessors [no real parallelism]
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 13
User-level threads
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 14
Kernel-level threads
Kernel aware of the presence of threads
Better scheduling decisions, more expensive
Better for multiprocessors, more overheads for uniprocessors
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 15
Light-weight Processes
Several LWPs per heavy-weight process
User-level threads package
Create/destroy threads and synchronization primitives
Multithreaded applications create multiple threads,
assign threads to LWPs (one-one, many-one, many-many)
Each LWP, when scheduled, searches for a runnable thread
[two-level scheduling]
Shared thread table: no kernel support needed
When a LWP thread block on system call, switch to kernel
mode and OS context switches to another LWP
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 16
LWP Example
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 17
Thread Packages
Posix Threads (pthreads)
Widely used threads package
Conforms to the Posix standard
Sample calls: pthread_create,
Typical used in C/C++ applications
Can be implemented as user-level or kernel-level or via LWPs
Java Threads
Native thread support built into the language
Threads are scheduled by the JVM
Computer Science
CS677: Distributed OS
Lecture 6, page 18
