Virtual machine and/or multi-level scheduling support on systems with asymmetric processor cores

Abstract

The present invention relates to a virtual machine and/or a multi-Level Scheduling Support on systems with asymmetric processor cores. Different processor cores in a computing device can support different features. In one or more embodiments, the features supported by each of multiple physical processor cores of a computing device are identified. A set of one or more features of the multiple physical processor cores to make available to virtual processor cores of the virtual machine are determined based at least in part on both the one or more features supported by each of the multiple physical processor cores and a number of virtual processor cores of the virtual machine. In additional embodiments, a multi-level scheduling model is used. An operating system level scheduler of an operating system schedules multiple applications for execution on multiple processor cores, and a user level scheduler of an application schedules application threads of that application for execution on one or more of the multiple processor cores.

Description

technical field [0001] The present invention relates to computers, and more particularly to systems with asymmetric processor cores. Background technique [0002] Computer manufacturers often use chips that include multiple processor cores to boost performance. It may happen that different processor cores on the same chip support different features, which may be referred to as asymmetric processor cores. However, using asymmetric processor cores in computers is not without its own problems. One such problem is that it can be difficult to run a virtual machine with multiple virtual processor cores on such a computer, because there is usually no permanent association. This can lead to a situation where a virtual processor core is limited to using only features supported by all physical processor cores, which reduces the benefit of having an asymmetric processor core. [0003] Another problem with using asymmetric processor cores in computers is that operating systems and a...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

One such problem is that it can be difficult to run a virtual machine with multiple virtual processor cores on such a computer, because there is usually no permanent association of

This can lead to a situation where virtual processor cores are limited to using only features supported by all physical processor cores, which reduces the benefits of having asymmetric processor cores

[0003] Another problem with using asymmetric processor cores in computers is that operating systems and applications can have difficulty managing the heterogeneous nature of the systems they run on

This can lead to a situation where a system thread or application thread is scheduled on a core that does not support the feature used by the thread, and in some cases can cause the feature to problem, which can cause performance problems in other cases

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