Chapter 4 THREADS & CONCURRENCY

Chapter 4: Threads &
Concurrency
Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018
Chapter 4: Threads
 Overview
 Multicore Programming
 Multithreading Models
 Thread Libraries
 Implicit Threading
 Threading Issues
 Operating System Examples
Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition 4.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018
Objectives
 Identify the basic components of a thread, and contrast threads
and processes
 Describe the benefits and challenges of designng
multithreaded applications
 Illustrate different approaches to implicit threading including
thread pools, fork-join, and Grand Central Dispatch
 Describe how the Windows and Linux operating systems
represent threads
 Design multithreaded applications using the Pthreads, Java,
and Windows threading APIs
Motivation
 Most modern applications are multithreaded

 Threads run within application
 Multiple tasks with the application can be implemented by
separate threads
 Update display
 Fetch data
 Spell checking
 Answer a network request
 Process creation is heavy-weight while thread creation is light-
weight
 Can simplify code, increase efficiency
 Kernels are generally multithreaded
Single and Multithreaded Processes
Multithreaded Server Architecture
Benefits
 Responsiveness – may allow continued execution if part of

process is blocked, especially important for user interfaces
 Resource Sharing – threads share resources of process, easier
than shared memory or message passing
 Economy – cheaper than process creation, thread switching
lower overhead than context switching
 Scalability – process can take advantage of multicore
architectures
Multicore Programming
 Multicore or multiprocessor systems putting pressure on

programmers, challenges include:
 Dividing activities
 Balance
 Data splitting
 Data dependency
 Testing and debugging
 Parallelism implies a system can perform more than one task
simultaneously
 Concurrency supports more than one task making progress
 Single processor / core, scheduler providing concurrency
Concurrency vs. Parallelism
 Concurrent execution on single-core system:
 Parallelism on a multi-core system:
Multicore Programming
 Types of parallelism
 Data parallelism – distributes subsets of the same data
across multiple cores, same operation on each
 Task parallelism – distributing threads across cores, each
thread performing unique operation
Data and Task Parallelism
Amdahl’s Law
 Identifies performance gains from adding additional cores to an application that
has both serial and parallel components
 S is serial portion
 N processing cores
 That is, if application is 75% parallel / 25% serial, moving from 1 to 2 cores
results in speedup of 1.6 times
 As N approaches infinity, speedup approaches 1 / S
Serial portion of an application has disproportionate effect on performance

gained by adding additional cores
 But does the law take into account contemporary multicore systems?
Amdahl’s Law
User Threads and Kernel Threads
 User threads - management done by user-level threads library

 Three primary thread libraries:
 POSIX Pthreads
 Windows threads
 Java threads
 Kernel threads - Supported by the Kernel
 Examples – virtually all general purpose operating systems, including:
 Windows
 Linux
 Mac OS X
 iOS
 Android
User and Kernel Threads
Multithreading Models
 Many-to-One
 One-to-One
 Many-to-Many
Many-to-One
 Many user-level threads mapped to

single kernel thread
 One thread blocking causes all to block
 Multiple threads may not run in parallel
on muticore system because only one
may be in kernel at a time
 Few systems currently use this model
 Examples:
 Solaris Green Threads
 GNU Portable Threads
One-to-One
 Each user-level thread maps to kernel thread
 Creating a user-level thread creates a kernel thread
 More concurrency than many-to-one
 Number of threads per process sometimes
restricted due to overhead
 Examples
 Windows
 Linux
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
 Windows with the ThreadFiber
package
 Otherwise not very common
Two-level Model
 Similar to M:M, except that it allows a user thread to be
bound to kernel thread
Thread Libraries
 Thread library provides programmer with API for creating

and managing threads
 Two primary ways of implementing
 Library entirely in user space
 Kernel-level library supported by the OS
Pthreads
 May be provided either as user-level or kernel-level

 A POSIX standard (IEEE 1003.1c) API for thread creation and
synchronization
 Specification, not implementation
 API specifies behavior of the thread library, implementation is
up to development of the library
 Common in UNIX operating systems (Linux & Mac OS X)
Pthreads Example
Pthreads Example (cont)
Pthreads Code for Joining 10 Threads
perating System Concepts – 9 th Edition 4. 21 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013
Windows Multithreaded C Program
Windows Multithreaded C Program (Cont.)
Java Threads
 Java threads are managed by the JVM
 Typically implemented using the threads model provided by underlying OS
 Java threads may be created by:
 Extending Thread class
 Implementing the Runnable interface
 Standard practice is to implement Runnable interface
Java Threads
Implementing Runnable interface:
Creating a thread:
Waiting on a thread:
Java Executor Framework
 Rather than explicitly creating threads, Java also allows thread creation
around the Executor interface:
 The Executor is used as follows:
Java Executor Framework
Java Executor Framework (cont)
Implicit Threading
 Growing in popularity as numbers of threads increase,

program correctness more difficult with explicit threads
 Creation and management of threads done by compilers and
run-time libraries rather than programmers
 Five methods explored
 Thread Pools
 Fork-Join
 OpenMP
 Grand Central Dispatch
 Intel Threading Building Blocks
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
 Separating task to be performed from mechanics of
creating task allows different strategies for running task
 i.e.Tasks could be scheduled to run periodically
 Windows API supports thread pools:
Java Thread Pools
 Three factory methods for creating thread pools in Executors class:
Java Thread Pools (cont)
Fork-Join Parallelism
 Multiple threads (tasks) are forked, and then joined.
 General algorithm for fork-join strategy:
Fork-Join Parallelism in Java
 The ForkJoinTask is an abstract base class
 RecursiveTask and RecursiveAction classes extend ForkJoinTask
 RecursiveTask returns a result (via the return value from the compute()
method)
 RecursiveAction does not return a result
OpenMP
 Set of compiler directives and an
API for C, C++, FORTRAN
 Provides support for parallel
programming in shared-memory
environments
 Identifies parallel regions –
blocks of code that can run in
parallel
#pragma omp parallel
Create as many threads as there are
cores
 Run the for loop in parallel
Grand Central Dispatch
 Apple technology for macOS and iOS operating systems

 Extensions to C, C++ and Objective-C languages, API, and run-
time library
 Allows identification of parallel sections
 Manages most of the details of threading
 Block is in “^{ }” :
ˆ{ printf("I am a block"); }
 Blocks placed in dispatch queue

 Assigned to available thread in thread pool when removed
from queue
 Two types of dispatch queues:
 serial – blocks removed in FIFO order, queue is per process,
called main queue
 Programmers can create additional serial queues within
program
 concurrent – removed in FIFO order but several may be
removed at a time
 Four system wide queues divided by quality of service:
o QOS_CLASS_USER_INTERACTIVE
o QOS_CLASS_USER_INITIATED
o QOS_CLASS_USER_UTILITY
o QOS_CLASS_USER_BACKGROUND
 For the Swift language a task is defined as a closure – similar to a block,
minus the caret
 Closures are submitted to the queue using the dispatch_async()
function:
Intel Threading Building Blocks (TBB)
 Template library for designing parallel C++ programs
 A serial version of a simple for loop
 The same for loop written using TBB with parallel_for statement:
Threading Issues
 Semantics of fork() and exec() system calls
 Signal handling
 Synchronous and asynchronous
 Thread cancellation of target thread
 Asynchronous or deferred
 Thread-local storage
 Scheduler Activations
Semantics of fork() and exec()
 Does fork()duplicate only the calling thread or all

threads?
 Some UNIXes have two versions of fork
 exec() usually works as normal – replace the running
process including all threads
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 by one of two signal handlers:
1. default
2. user-defined
 Every signal has default handler that kernel runs when
handling signal
 User-defined signal handler can override default
 For single-threaded, signal delivered to process
Signal Handling (Cont.)
 Where should a signal be delivered for multi-threaded?
 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 thread to receive all signals for the
process
Thread Cancellation
 Terminating a thread before it has finished
 Thread to be canceled is target thread
 Two general approaches:
 Asynchronous cancellation terminates the target thread
immediately
 Deferred cancellation allows the target thread to periodically
check if it should be cancelled
 Pthread code to create and cancel a thread:
Thread Cancellation (Cont.)
 Invoking thread cancellation requests cancellation, but actual
cancellation depends on thread state
 If thread has cancellation disabled, cancellation remains pending

until thread enables it
 Default type is deferred
 Cancellation only occurs when thread reaches cancellation
point
 I.e. pthread_testcancel()
 Then cleanup handler is invoked
 On Linux systems, thread cancellation is handled through signals
Thread Cancellation in Java
 Deferred cancellation uses the interrupt() method, which sets the
interrupted status of a thread.
 A thread can then check to see if it has been interrupted:
Thread-Local Storage
 Thread-local storage (TLS) 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)
 Different from local variables
 Local variables visible only during single function
invocation
 TLS visible across function invocations
 Similar to static data
 TLS is unique to each thread
Scheduler Activations
 Both M:M and Two-level models require
communication to maintain the appropriate
number of kernel threads allocated to the
application
 Typically use an intermediate data structure
between user and kernel threads – lightweight
process (LWP)
 Appears to be a virtual processor on which
process can schedule user thread to run
 Each LWP attached to kernel thread
 How many LWPs to create?
 Scheduler activations provide upcalls - a
communication mechanism from the kernel to
the upcall handler in the thread library
 This communication allows an application to
maintain the correct number kernel threads
Operating System Examples
 Windows Threads
 Linux Threads
Windows Threads
 Windows API – primary API for Windows applications
 Implements the one-to-one mapping, kernel-level
 Each thread contains
 A thread id
 Register set representing state of processor
 Separate user and kernel stacks for when thread runs in
user mode or kernel mode
 Private data storage area used by run-time libraries and
dynamic link libraries (DLLs)
 The register set, stacks, and private storage area are known as
the context of the thread
Windows Threads (Cont.)
 The primary data structures of a thread include:

 ETHREAD (executive thread block) – includes pointer to
process to which thread belongs and to KTHREAD, in
kernel space
 KTHREAD (kernel thread block) – scheduling and
synchronization info, kernel-mode stack, pointer to TEB, in
kernel space
 TEB (thread environment block) – thread id, user-mode
stack, thread-local storage, in user space
Windows Threads Data Structures
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)
 Flags control behavior
 struct task_struct points to process data structures

(shared or unique)
End of Chapter 4
Operating System Concepts – 10th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2018

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Chapter 4: Threads &

 Most modern applications are multithreaded

 Responsiveness – may allow continued execution if part of

 Multicore or multiprocessor systems putting pressure on

 Parallelism on a multi-core system:

Serial portion of an application has disproportionate effect on performance

 User threads - management done by user-level threads library

 Many user-level threads mapped to

 Thread library provides programmer with API for creating

 May be provided either as user-level or kernel-level

perating System Concepts – 9 th Edition 4. 21 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013

 Standard practice is to implement Runnable interface

 The Executor is used as follows:

 Growing in popularity as numbers of threads increase,

 Apple technology for macOS and iOS operating systems

 Blocks placed in dispatch queue

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

 If thread has cancellation disabled, cancellation remains pending

 A thread can then check to see if it has been interrupted:

 Thread-local storage (TLS) allows each thread to have its

 The primary data structures of a thread include:

 struct task_struct points to process data structures

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