Real-time scheduling of transactions in multicore systems

International audienceTransactional memory has attracted much interest for multicore systems as it eases programming and avoids the problems of lock-based methods. However, introducing real-time scheduling of transactions in multicore systems is an open problem. Existing solutions for real-time scheduling consider either tasks in multiprocessor systems or transactions in database systems. In this paper, we show that these solutions are not suitable for multicore systems. And we discuss the main challenges to introduce real-time scheduling within transactional memory in multicore systems

Partitioned EDF Scheduling in Multicore systems with Quality of Service constraints

International audienceIn this paper we study the partitioned EDF scheduling in a homogeneous multiprocessor environment with Quality of Service (QoS) constraints. The system considered here is a real-time multiprocessor system assumed to be powered by rechargeable batteries. We address the issue of how to best partition a set of firm real-time tasks that can occasionally skip one instance according to a predefined QoS threshold. The main goal is to minimize the energy consumption of the system while offering solutions with respect to transient energy starvation situations the system can experiment. The contribution of the paper is twofold. First, we present a schedulability analysis of firm multiprocessor task sets under QoS constraints. Second we propose new partitionning heuristics integrating skips. The evaluation is conducted from several points of view (minimization of the total processor number, maximization of the spare capacity on each processor)

Real-time scheduling of transactions in multicore systems

International audienceTransactional memory has attracted much interest for multicore systems as it eases programming and avoids the problems of lock-based methods. However, introducing real-time scheduling of transactions in multicore systems is an open problem. Existing solutions for real-time scheduling consider either tasks in multiprocessor systems or transactions in database systems. In this paper, we show that these solutions are not suitable for multicore systems. And we discuss the main challenges to introduce real-time scheduling within transactional memory in multicore systems

Quality of Service Scheduling in the Firm Real-Time Systems

Most scheduling algorithms developed for soft and firm real-time systems lack the ability to enforce constraints on the upper limit of misses. Unbounded consecutive time constraint violations may occur without such an enforcement. Realistically, if consecutive instances of a task fail to complete before their deadlines, then the system will eventually suffer from a failure. This indicates that there are additional constraints. These constraints express the minimum degree of timeliness that must be enforced for firm real-time tasks. This is the subject of this chapter

Synchronisation et Autonomie énergétique des Systèmes temps réel embarqués

The work presented in this document addresses two main research concerns: (i) the synchronization of multicore real-time applications, and (ii) the energy autonomy of embedded real-time systems. These problems are approached from a scheduling point of view by taking into account several types of constraints: temporal constraints, resource sharing constraints, quality of service (QoS) constraints, and energy constraints.Efficiently managing concurrent memory access in a multicore real-time context is complex. Systematic locking can reduce the parallelism of the execution platform and thus lead to a significant performance loss. Based on this observation, we have studied the adaptation of transactional memories (non-blocking synchronization mechanisms) to multicore real-time systems. Through an experimental study, we compared the performance of several transactional memories in order to determine the key factors (e.g. operating system, scheduling policy, memory allocator) impacting the execution jitter of transactions, jitter that can directly impact the respect of the temporal constraints of tasks in a real-time system. We then proposed a hard real-time software transactional memory, called STM-HRT, which guarantees the progress of all transactions in the system. A functional and temporal analysis of the STM-HRT allowed us to validate the proposed non-blocking synchronization mechanism.New generation embedded systems such as wireless sensor nodes have been proliferating in recent years. For many of these systems, energy autonomy is a key issue. The technology of energy harvesting, which consists of capturing energy from the environment to power a system, makes it possible in particular to provide these resource-constrained embedded systems with the capacity for energy self-sufficiency. The intelligence embedded in these systems has very often real-time requirements in terms of software processing. It is then necessary to guarantee the perpetual operation of the system by jointly managing two types of constraints: time and energy. This is precisely the purpose of our contributions on this topic, by considering the problem from the point of view of the scheduling of tasks on the processor. We first highlighted the inefficiency of “classical” real-time schedulers such as EDF, which are unable to cope with fluctuations in the supply energy. However, we have shown that it remains the best non-idling scheduler in the context of energy harvesting and that it is the best choice of integration for a system that cannot have a predictive estimate of the exploitable energy. Our work then consisted in identifying some key properties of a scheduler in the energy harvesting context. Then, we contributed to the problem of the feasibility of a set hard real-time tasks in this same context, by proposing a new test which is robust with respect to the power of the energy source. The contributions presented right after aim at providing solutions adapted to situations of transient processing and/or energy consumption overload that a system may suffer from. Based on a new task model integrating QoS constraints, we have proposed new schedulers controlling in particular the number and identity of task jobs skipped in case of overload. Finally, we proposed a necessary feasibility test integrating both QoS and energy constraints.Les travaux présentés dans ce document s’articulent selon deux axes de recherche principaux : (i) la synchronisation d’applications temps réel multicœur, et (ii) l’autonomie énergétique des systèmes temps réel embarqués. Ces problématiques sont abordées du point de vue de l’ordonnancement en prenant en compte plusieurs types de contraintes : des contraintes temporelles, des contraintes de partage de ressources, des contraintes de qualité de service (QoS), et des contraintes d’énergie.Gérer efficacement les accès concurrents à la mémoire dans un contexte temps réel multicœur se révèle complexe. Le verrouillage systématique peut réduire le parallélisme de la plate-forme d’exécution et engendrer par là-même une baisse significative des performances. Forts de ce constat, nous avons donc étudié l’adaptation des mémoires transactionnelles (mécanismes de synchronisation non-bloquant) aux systèmes temps réel multicœur. Au travers d’une étude expérimentale, nous avons comparé les performances de plusieurs mémoires transactionnelles afin de déterminer les facteurs clés (ex : système d’exploitation, politique d’ordonnancement, allocateur mémoire) influant sur la gigue d’exécution des transactions, gigue pouvant impacter directement le respect des contraintes temporelles des tâches dans un système temps réel. Nous avons ensuite proposé une mémoire transactionnelle logicielle temps réel hard, la STM-HRT, permettant de garantir la progression de toutes les transactions du système. Une analyse fonctionnelle et temporelle de la STM-HRT nous a permis de valider le mécanisme de synchronisation non bloquant proposé.Les systèmes embarqués de nouvelle génération tels que les nœuds de capteurs sans fil se sont multipliés ces dernières années. Pour nombre de ces systèmes, l’autonomie énergétique est une problématique capitale. La technologie du energy harvesting consistant à capter l’énergie dans l’environnement pour alimenter un système, permet en particulier de doter ces systèmes embarqués aux ressources contraintes, d’une capacité d’autosuffisance énergétique. L’informatique “intelligente” embarquée au sein de ces systèmes possède très souvent des exigences temps réel au niveau des traitements logiciels. Il convient alors de garantir le fonctionnement perpétuel du système en gérant conjointement deux types de contraintes : le temps et l’énergie. C’est précisément l’objet de nos contributions sur cette thématique, en considérant le problème du point de vue de l’ordonnancement des tâches applicatives sur le processeur. Nous avons tout d’abord mis en évidence l’inefficacité des ordonnanceurs temps réel “classiques” tels que EDF, incapable à s’accommoder des fluctuations de l’énergie d’alimentation. Nous avons cependant montré qu’il reste le meilleur ordonnanceur non-oisif dans le contexte du energy harvesting et qu’il constitue le meilleur choix d’intégration pour un système ne pouvant disposer d’une estimation prédictive de l’énergie exploitable. Nos travaux ont ensuite consisté en l’identification de quelques-unes propriétés clés d’un ordonnanceur dans le contexte du energy harvesting. Puis, nous avons contribué au problème de la faisabilité d’un ensemble de tâches temps réel à contraintes strictes dans ce même contexte, par la proposition d’un nouveau test, robuste vis-à-vis de la puissance de la source d’énergie. Les contributions présentées par la suite visent à apporter des solutions adaptées aux situations de surcharge temporaire de traitement et/ou de consommation énergétique dont un système peut souffrir. Sur la base d’un nouveau modèle de tâches intégrant des contraintes de QoS, nous avons proposé de nouveaux ordonnanceurs contrôlant notamment le nombre et l’identité des jobs de tâches abandonnés en cas de surcharge. Nous avons enfin proposé un test de faisabilité nécessaire intégrant conjointement les contraintes de QoS et d’énergie

Energy autonomy of real-time systems

International audienc

Systèmes temps réel autonomes en énergie

International audienc

EDF-based real-time scheduling for self-powered sensors: a survey of main theoretical results

International audienc

Clairvoyance and Online Scheduling in Real-Time Energy Harvesting Systems

International audienceReal-time energy harvesting systems are designed using a microprocessor, a rechargeable energy storage unit and an energy harvester. The theoretical analysis shows that an optimal solution to the underlying online scheduling problem requires time lookahead which can be incompatible with the common stochastic nature of ambient energy