Chapter 4: Threads

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne

 Chapter 4: Threads

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.2 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Understanding Threads
 Threads, also known as lightweight processes, are
independent sequences of execution within a process.
 Unlike traditional processes, threads share the same
memory space and resources within a process context,
allowing for faster communication and synchronization.
 Threads can execute concurrently, providing advantages
such as improved responsiveness and better utilization of
multiprocessor systems.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.3 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Thread Creation and Management
 The operating system provides mechanisms for creating,
managing, and scheduling threads within a process.
 Thread creation involves allocating resources and initializing
thread-specific data structures.
 Thread management tasks include scheduling threads for
execution, handling thread states (such as running, ready,
blocked), and managing thread termination.
 Operating systems typically offer APIs or libraries for thread
management, providing developers with the necessary tools
to create and control threads effectively.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.4 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.5 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Multithreaded Server Architecture

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.6 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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
multiprocessor architectures

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.7 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Continue…
 Multithreading offers various benefits, including improved
responsiveness, enhanced throughput, better resource
utilization, and increased scalability.
 By allowing concurrent execution of multiple tasks,
multithreading enables applications to better utilize modern
multicore processors and exploit parallelism.
 Multithreading is widely used in diverse domains, including
operating systems, database systems, web servers, and
multimedia applications, to achieve better performance and
responsiveness.

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.8 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Single and Multithreaded Processes

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.9 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Concurrency vs. Parallelism
 Concurrent execution on single-core system:

 Parallelism on a multi-core system:

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.10 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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
 Solaris
 Linux
 Tru64 UNIX
 Mac OS X

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.11 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 Multithreading Models

 Many-to-One

 One-to-One

 Many-to-Many

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.12 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.13 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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
 Solaris 9 and later

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.14 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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 with the ThreadFiber
package

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.15 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.16 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 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

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.17 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne
 END

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition 4.18 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne