CODEWITHSUNDEEP
operating-systemmulticoreparallel-processing
Dervin Thunk
Dervin Thunk

Reputation: 20119

Multicore and operating systems

What changes, if any, would an operating system need to implement to take full advantage of multicore systems? I ask this because I'm doing some research on parallel algorithms and the scheduler, for example, gets in my way of more theoretically-driven work. Are there other issues?

Upvotes: 3

Views: 257

Answers (2)

ninjalj
ninjalj

Reputation: 43688

Besides what it has to do for taking full advantage of SMP, it's also convenient to be able to have some knowledge of hierarchy and relative costs, see this LWN article about scheduling domains.

Upvotes: 1

Per Knytt
Per Knytt

Reputation: 2011

Thread migration, load balancing, core affinity for threads. If "full advantage" means optimal usage then load balancing in particular probably makes it practically impossible. If "full advantage" has some leeway a few simple heuristics can probably go a long way. Any "non-uniform access" resource (such as if one particular core handles all interrupts for a network interface for instance) will add complications to the load balancing decisions.

Upvotes: 1

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