PROCESSES AND CPU SCHEDULING I

Processes

 Process Concept
 Process Scheduling
 Operations on Processes
 Cooperating Processes
 Interprocess Communication
 Communication in Client-Server Systems
 Process Concept

 An operating system executes a variety of programs:

 Batch system – jobs
 Time-shared systems – user programs or tasks
 Textbook uses the terms job and process almost
interchangeably
 Process – a program in execution; process execution
must progress in sequential fashion
 A process includes:
 program counter
 stack
 data section
 Process State

 As a process executes, it changes state

 new: The process is being created
 running: Instructions are being executed
 waiting: The process is waiting for some event to occur
 ready: The process is waiting to be assigned to a process
 terminated: The process has finished execution
Diagram of Process State
 Process Control Block (PCB)

Information associated with each process

 Process state
 Program counter
 CPU registers
 CPU scheduling information
 Memory-management information
 Accounting information
 I/O status information
Process Control Block (PCB)
CPU Switch From Process to Process
 Process Scheduling Queues
 Job queue – set of all processes in the system
 Ready queue – set of all processes residing in main memory,
ready and waiting to execute
 Device queues – set of processes waiting for an I/O device
 Process migration between the various queues
Ready Queue And Various I/O Device Queues
Representation of Process Scheduling
 Schedulers

 Long-term scheduler (or job scheduler) – selects which

processes should be brought into the ready queue
 Short-term scheduler (or CPU scheduler) – selects which
process should be executed next and allocates CPU
Addition of Medium Term Scheduling
 Schedulers (Cont.)
 Short-term scheduler is invoked very frequently (milliseconds) 
(must be fast)
 Long-term scheduler is invoked very infrequently (seconds,
minutes)  (may be slow)
 The long-term scheduler controls the degree of
multiprogramming
 Processes can be described as either:
 I/O-bound process – spends more time doing I/O than
computations, many short CPU bursts
 CPU-bound process – spends more time doing computations; few
very long CPU bursts
 Context Switch
 When CPU switches to another process, the system must save
the state of the old process and load the saved state for the new
process
 Context-switch time is overhead; the system does no useful work
while switching
 Time dependent on hardware support
 Process Creation
 Parent process create children processes, which, in turn create
other processes, forming a tree of processes
 Resource sharing
 Parent and children share all resources
 Children share subset of parent’s resources
 Parent and child share no resources
 Execution
 Parent and children execute concurrently
 Parent waits until children terminate
 Process Creation (Cont.)
 Address space
 Child duplicate of parent
 Child has a program loaded into it
 UNIX examples
 fork system call creates new process
 exec system call used after a fork to replace the process’ memory
space with a new program
C Program Forking Separate Process
#include <stdio.h>
#include <unistd.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
int pid;
/* fork another process */
pid = fork();
if (pid < 0) { /* error occurred */
fprintf(stderr, "Fork Failed");
exit(-1);
}
else if (pid == 0) { /* child process */
execlp("/bin/ls","ls",NULL);
}
else { /* parent process */
/* parent will wait for the child to complete
*/
wait(NULL);
printf("Child Complete");
exit(0);
}
}
Processes Tree on a UNIX System
 Process Termination
 Process executes last statement and asks the operating system
to decide it (exit)
 Output data from child to parent (via wait)
 Process’ resources are deallocated by operating system
 Parent may terminate execution of children processes (abort)
 Child has exceeded allocated resources
 Task assigned to child is no longer required
 If parent is exiting
 Some operating system do not allow child to continue if its parent
terminates
– All children terminated - cascading termination
 Cooperating Processes
 Independent process cannot affect or be affected by the
execution of another process
 Cooperating process can affect or be affected by the execution
of another process
 Advantages of process cooperation
 Information sharing
 Computation speed-up
 Modularity
 Convenience
 Producer-Consumer Problem
 Paradigm for cooperating processes, producer process
produces information that is consumed by a consumer process
 unbounded-buffer places no practical limit on the size of the buffer
 bounded-buffer assumes that there is a fixed buffer size
Bounded-Buffer – Shared-Memory Solution

public interface Buffer

{
// producers call this method
public abstract void insert(Object item);
// consumers call this method
public abstract Object remove();
}
Bounded-Buffer – Shared Memory Solution
import java.util.*;
public class BoundedBuffer implements Buffer
{
private static final int BUFFER SIZE = 5;
private int count; // number of items in the buffer
private int in; // points to the next free position
private int out; // points to the next full position
private Object[] buffer;
public BoundedBuffer() {
// buffer is initially empty
count = 0;
in = 0;
out = 0;
buffer = new Object[BUFFER SIZE];
}
// producers calls this method
public void insert(Object item) {
// Slide 4.24
}
// consumers calls this method
public Object remove() {
// Figure 4.25
}
}
 Bounded-Buffer – Insert() Method

public void insert(Object item) {

while (count == BUFFER SIZE)
; // do nothing -- no free buffers
// add an item to the buffer
++count;
buffer[in] = item;
in = (in + 1) % BUFFER SIZE;
}
Bounded Buffer – Remove() Method

public Object remove() {

Object item;
while (count == 0)
; // do nothing -- nothing to consume
// remove an item from the buffer
--count;
item = buffer[out];
out = (out + 1) % BUFFER SIZE;
return item;
}
 Interprocess Communication (IPC)
 Mechanism for processes to communicate and to synchronize
their actions
 Message system – processes communicate with each other
without resorting to shared variables
 IPC facility provides two operations:
 send(message) – message size fixed or variable
 receive(message)
 If P and Q wish to communicate, they need to:
 establish a communication link between them
 exchange messages via send/receive
 Implementation of communication link
 physical (e.g., shared memory, hardware bus)
 logical (e.g., logical properties)
 Implementation Questions
 How are links established?
 Can a link be associated with more than two processes?
 How many links can there be between every pair of
communicating processes?
 What is the capacity of a link?
 Is the size of a message that the link can accommodate fixed or
variable?
 Is a link unidirectional or bi-directional?
 Direct Communication
 Processes must name each other explicitly:
 send (P, message) – send a message to process P
 receive(Q, message) – receive a message from process Q
 Properties of communication link
 Links are established automatically
 A link is associated with exactly one pair of communicating
processes
 Between each pair there exists exactly one link
 The link may be unidirectional, but is usually bi-directional
 Indirect Communication
 Messages are directed and received from mailboxes
(also referred to as ports)
 Each mailbox has a unique id
 Processes can communicate only if they share a mailbox
 Properties of communication link
 Link established only if processes share a common mailbox
 A link may be associated with many processes
 Each pair of processes may share several communication
links
 Link may be unidirectional or bi-directional
 Indirect Communication

 Operations
 create a new mailbox
 send and receive messages through mailbox
 destroy a mailbox
 Primitives are defined as:

send(A, message) – send a message to mailbox A

receive(A, message) – receive a message from mailbox A
 Indirect Communication
 Mailbox sharing
 P1, P2, and P3 share mailbox A
 P1, sends; P2 and P3 receive
 Who gets the message?
 Solutions
 Allow a link to be associated with at most two processes
 Allow only one process at a time to execute a receive operation
 Allow the system to select arbitrarily the receiver. Sender is notified
who the receiver was.
 Synchronization
 Message passing may be either blocking or non-blocking
 Blocking is considered synchronous
 Blocking send has the sender block until the message is received
 Blocking receive has the receiver block until a message is
available
 Non-blocking is considered asynchronous
 Non-blocking send has the sender send the message and
continue
 Non-blocking receive has the receiver receive a valid message or
null
 Buffering
 Queue of messages attached to the link; implemented in one of
three ways
1. Zero capacity – 0 messages
Sender must wait for receiver (rendezvous)
2. Bounded capacity – finite length of n messages
Sender must wait if link full
3. Unbounded capacity – infinite length
Sender never waits
 Client-Server Communication
 Sockets
 Remote Procedure Calls
 Remote Method Invocation (Java)
 Sockets
 A socket is defined as an endpoint for communication
 Concatenation of IP address and port
 The socket 161.25.19.8:1625 refers to port 1625 on host
161.25.19.8
 Communication consists between a pair of sockets
Socket Communication
 Remote Procedure Calls
 Remote procedure call (RPC) abstracts procedure calls between
processes on networked systems.
 Stubs – client-side proxy for the actual procedure on the server.
 The client-side stub locates the server and marshalls the
parameters.
 The server-side stub receives this message, unpacks the
marshalled parameters, and peforms the procedure on the
server.
Execution of RPC
 Remote Method Invocation
 Remote Method Invocation (RMI) is a Java mechanism similar to
RPCs.
 RMI allows a Java program on one machine to invoke a method
on a remote object.
Marshalling Parameters
 Threads
 A thread (or lightweight process) is a basic unit of CPU
utilization; it consists of:
 program counter
 register set
 stack space
 A thread shares with its peer threads its:
 code section
 data section
 operating-system resources
collectively know as a task.
 A traditional or heavyweight process is equal to a task with one
thread
 Threads (Cont.)
 In a multiple threaded task, while one server thread is blocked and
waiting, a second thread in the same task can run.
 Cooperation of multiple threads in same job confers higher throughput
and improved performance.
 Applications that require sharing a common buffer (i.e., producer-
consumer) benefit from thread utilization.
 Threads provide a mechanism that allows sequential processes to
make blocking system calls while also achieving parallelism.
 Kernel-supported threads (Mach and OS/2).
 User-level threads; supported above the kernel, via a set of library
calls at the user level (Project Andrew from CMU).
 Hybrid approach implements both user-level and kernel-supported
threads (Solaris 2).
Multiple Threads within a Task
 Threads Support in Solaris 2
 Solaris 2 is a version of UNIX with support for threads at the
kernel and user levels, symmetric multiprocessing, and
real-time scheduling.
 LWP – intermediate level between user-level threads and
kernel-level threads.
 Resource needs of thread types:
 Kernel thread: small data structure and a stack; thread
switching does not require changing memory access information
– relatively fast.
 LWP: PCB with register data, accounting and memory
information,; switching between LWPs is relatively slow.
 User-level thread: only need stack and program counter; no
kernel involvement means fast switching. Kernel only sees the
LWPs that support user-level threads.
Solaris 2 Threads