Dynamic Load Balancing with Hardware Queues for Multi-Core Packet Processing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing multi-core computing environments face inefficiencies in load balancing and workload distribution, leading to increased latency, congestion, and power consumption due to inefficient allocation of computing resources, particularly in multi-access edge computing (MEC) networks, which are exacerbated by high packet throughput and the need for improved latency and Quality of Service in 5G networks.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a hardware queue manager (HQM) as a Dynamic Load Balancer (DLB) to manage queues in hardware, reducing direct core-to-core interactions and enabling dynamic load balancing and pipelined processing across multiple producer and consumer cores, optimizing throughput and bandwidth utilization.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If software-based queue management is used, then implementation flexibility is maintained, but performance degrades due to spinlock penalties and core interactions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces software-based queue management with a hardware-implemented queue manager that uses dedicated hardware queues and load balancing logic. This substitution eliminates spinlock penalties and reduces core-to-core interactions by moving queue operations to hardware level, thereby improving processing throughput and reducing power consumption.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a hardware queue manager as an intermediary component between producer cores and consumer cores. This intermediary handles queue operations and load balancing in hardware, reducing the burden on CPU cores and eliminating the need for software-based spinlocks, thus improving system performance and reducing power consumption.
2Loss of time
If direct core-to-core interactions are used for load balancing, then implementation simplicity is maintained, but latency increases due to frequent interactions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces software-based core-to-core interactions with hardware-based queue management. The hardware queue manager handles load balancing and queue operations in hardware, reducing latency by eliminating software overhead and spinlock penalties while maintaining manageable complexity through dedicated hardware logic.
3Adaptability or versatility
If static workload distribution is used, then system design simplicity is maintained, but adaptability decreases in response to changing load conditions
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic workload distribution through hardware-based load balancing logic that can adapt to changing conditions. The system dynamically assigns workloads to consumer cores based on real-time needs, improving adaptability while managing complexity through hardware-level automation of the load balancing decisions.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods, apparatus, systems, and articles of manufacture are disclosed for dynamic load balancing for multi-core computing environments. An example apparatus includes a first and a plurality of second cores of a processor, and circuitry in a die of the processor separate from the first and the second cores, the circuitry to enqueue identifiers in one or more queues in the circuitry associated with respective ones of data packets of a packet flow, allocate one or more of the second cores to dequeue first ones of the identifiers in response to a throughput parameter of the first core not satisfying a throughput threshold to cause the one or more of the second cores to execute one or more operations on first ones of the data packets, and provide the first ones to one or more data consumers to distribute the first data packets.