Chapter 4: Threads

Chapter 4: Threads

 Overview
 Multithreading Models
 Threading Issues
 Pthreads
 Windows XP Threads
 Linux Threads
 Java Threads

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Single and Multithreaded Processes

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.3 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Benefits

 Responsiveness
If 1 part is block even
 Resource Sharing
 Use same resources. Add space

 Economy
context switch
 Utilization of MP Architectures
 Many run concurrently

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 User Threads

 Thread management done by user-level threads library

 Three primary thread libraries:

 POSIX Pthreads
 Win32 threads
 Java threads

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 Kernel Threads

 Supported by the Kernel

 Examples
 Windows XP/2000
 Solaris
 Linux
 Tru64 UNIX
 Mac OS X

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.6 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Multithreading Models

 Many-to-One

 One-to-One

 Many-to-Many

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.7 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Many-to-One

 Many user-level threads mapped to single kernel thread

 Examples:
 Solaris Green Threads
 GNU Portable Threads

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.8 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Many-to-One Model

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 One-to-One

 Each user-level thread maps to kernel thread

 Examples
 Windows NT/XP/2000
 Linux
 Solaris 9 and later
 DRAWBACK- creating user thread and kernal thread--
overhead

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 One-to-one Model

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 Many-to-Many Model

 Allows many user level threads to be mapped to many kernel

threads
 Allows the operating system to create a sufficient number of
kernel threads
 Solaris prior to version 9
 Windows NT/2000 with the ThreadFiber package

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 Many-to-Many Model

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.13 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Two-level Model

 Similar to M:M, except that it allows a user thread to be

bound to kernel thread
 Examples
 IRIX
 HP-UX
 Tru64 UNIX
 Solaris 8 and earlier

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 Two-level Model

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 Threading Issues

 Semantics of fork() and exec() system calls

 Thread cancellation
 Signal handling
 Thread pools
 Thread specific data
 Scheduler activations

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 Semantics of fork() and exec()

 Does fork() duplicate only the calling thread or all threads?

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 Thread Cancellation

 Terminating a thread before it has finished

 Two general approaches:
 Asynchronous cancellation terminates the target
thread immediately
 Deferred cancellation allows the target thread to
periodically check if it should be cancelled

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.18 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Signal Handling

 Signals are used in UNIX systems to notify a process that a

particular event has occurred
 A signal handler is used to process signals
1. Signal is generated by particular event
2. Signal is delivered to a process
3. Signal is handled
 Options:
 Deliver the signal to the thread to which the signal applies
 Deliver the signal to every thread in the process
 Deliver the signal to certain threads in the process
 Assign a specific threa to receive all signals for the process

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.19 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Thread Pools

 Create a number of threads in a pool where they await work

 Advantages:
 Usually slightly faster to service a request with an existing
thread than create a new thread
 Allows the number of threads in the application(s) to be
bound to the size of the pool

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 Thread Specific Data

 Allows each thread to have its own copy of data

 Useful when you do not have control over the thread
creation process (i.e., when using a thread pool)

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 Scheduler Activations

 Both M:M and Two-level models require communication to

maintain the appropriate number of kernel threads allocated
to the application
 Scheduler activations provide upcalls - a communication
mechanism from the kernel to the thread library
 This communication allows an application to maintain the
correct number kernel threads

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 Pthreads

 A POSIX standard (IEEE 1003.1c) API for thread

creation and synchronization
 API specifies behavior of the thread library,
implementation is up to development of the library
 Common in UNIX operating systems (Solaris, Linux,
Mac OS X)

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 Windows XP Threads

 Implements the one-to-one mapping

 Each thread contains
 A thread id
 Register set
 Separate user and kernel stacks
 Private data storage area
 The register set, stacks, and private storage area are known
as the context of the threads
 The primary data structures of a thread include:
 ETHREAD (executive thread block)
 KTHREAD (kernel thread block)
 TEB (thread environment block)

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 Linux Threads

 Linux refers to them as tasks rather than threads

 Thread creation is done through clone() system call
 clone() allows a child task to share the address space
of the parent task (process)

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.25 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
 Java Threads

 Java threads are managed by the JVM

 Java threads may be created by:

 Extending Thread class

 Implementing the Runnable interface

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 Java Thread States

Operating System Concepts – 7th edition, Jan 23, 2005 4.27 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2005
End of Chapter 4