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Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +01001 Deadline Task Scheduling
2 ------------------------
3
4CONTENTS
5========
6
7 0. WARNING
8 1. Overview
9 2. Scheduling algorithm
10 3. Scheduling Real-Time Tasks
Luca Abeni6aaa1022015-05-18 15:00:32 +020011 3.1 Definitions
12 3.2 Schedulability Analysis for Uniprocessor Systems
13 3.3 Schedulability Analysis for Multiprocessor Systems
14 3.4 Relationship with SCHED_DEADLINE Parameters
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010015 4. Bandwidth management
16 4.1 System-wide settings
17 4.2 Task interface
18 4.3 Default behavior
19 5. Tasks CPU affinity
20 5.1 SCHED_DEADLINE and cpusets HOWTO
21 6. Future plans
Juri Lellif5801932014-09-09 10:57:15 +010022 A. Test suite
Juri Lelli13924d22014-09-09 10:57:16 +010023 B. Minimal main()
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010024
25
260. WARNING
27==========
28
29 Fiddling with these settings can result in an unpredictable or even unstable
30 system behavior. As for -rt (group) scheduling, it is assumed that root users
31 know what they're doing.
32
33
341. Overview
35===========
36
37 The SCHED_DEADLINE policy contained inside the sched_dl scheduling class is
38 basically an implementation of the Earliest Deadline First (EDF) scheduling
39 algorithm, augmented with a mechanism (called Constant Bandwidth Server, CBS)
40 that makes it possible to isolate the behavior of tasks between each other.
41
42
432. Scheduling algorithm
44==================
45
46 SCHED_DEADLINE uses three parameters, named "runtime", "period", and
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +010047 "deadline", to schedule tasks. A SCHED_DEADLINE task should receive
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010048 "runtime" microseconds of execution time every "period" microseconds, and
49 these "runtime" microseconds are available within "deadline" microseconds
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +020050 from the beginning of the period. In order to implement this behavior,
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010051 every time the task wakes up, the scheduler computes a "scheduling deadline"
52 consistent with the guarantee (using the CBS[2,3] algorithm). Tasks are then
53 scheduled using EDF[1] on these scheduling deadlines (the task with the
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +010054 earliest scheduling deadline is selected for execution). Notice that the
55 task actually receives "runtime" time units within "deadline" if a proper
56 "admission control" strategy (see Section "4. Bandwidth management") is used
57 (clearly, if the system is overloaded this guarantee cannot be respected).
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010058
Luca Abeni3aa2dbe2015-05-18 15:00:26 +020059 Summing up, the CBS[2,3] algorithm assigns scheduling deadlines to tasks so
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010060 that each task runs for at most its runtime every period, avoiding any
61 interference between different tasks (bandwidth isolation), while the EDF[1]
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010062 algorithm selects the task with the earliest scheduling deadline as the one
63 to be executed next. Thanks to this feature, tasks that do not strictly comply
64 with the "traditional" real-time task model (see Section 3) can effectively
65 use the new policy.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010066
67 In more details, the CBS algorithm assigns scheduling deadlines to
68 tasks in the following way:
69
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +020070 - Each SCHED_DEADLINE task is characterized by the "runtime",
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010071 "deadline", and "period" parameters;
72
73 - The state of the task is described by a "scheduling deadline", and
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010074 a "remaining runtime". These two parameters are initially set to 0;
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010075
76 - When a SCHED_DEADLINE task wakes up (becomes ready for execution),
77 the scheduler checks if
78
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010079 remaining runtime runtime
80 ---------------------------------- > ---------
81 scheduling deadline - current time period
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010082
83 then, if the scheduling deadline is smaller than the current time, or
84 this condition is verified, the scheduling deadline and the
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +020085 remaining runtime are re-initialized as
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010086
87 scheduling deadline = current time + deadline
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010088 remaining runtime = runtime
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010089
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010090 otherwise, the scheduling deadline and the remaining runtime are
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010091 left unchanged;
92
93 - When a SCHED_DEADLINE task executes for an amount of time t, its
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010094 remaining runtime is decreased as
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010095
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +010096 remaining runtime = remaining runtime - t
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +010097
98 (technically, the runtime is decreased at every tick, or when the
99 task is descheduled / preempted);
100
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +0100101 - When the remaining runtime becomes less or equal than 0, the task is
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100102 said to be "throttled" (also known as "depleted" in real-time literature)
103 and cannot be scheduled until its scheduling deadline. The "replenishment
104 time" for this task (see next item) is set to be equal to the current
105 value of the scheduling deadline;
106
107 - When the current time is equal to the replenishment time of a
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +0100108 throttled task, the scheduling deadline and the remaining runtime are
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100109 updated as
110
111 scheduling deadline = scheduling deadline + period
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +0100112 remaining runtime = remaining runtime + runtime
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100113
114
1153. Scheduling Real-Time Tasks
116=============================
117
118 * BIG FAT WARNING ******************************************************
119 *
120 * This section contains a (not-thorough) summary on classical deadline
121 * scheduling theory, and how it applies to SCHED_DEADLINE.
122 * The reader can "safely" skip to Section 4 if only interested in seeing
123 * how the scheduling policy can be used. Anyway, we strongly recommend
124 * to come back here and continue reading (once the urge for testing is
125 * satisfied :P) to be sure of fully understanding all technical details.
126 ************************************************************************
127
128 There are no limitations on what kind of task can exploit this new
129 scheduling discipline, even if it must be said that it is particularly
130 suited for periodic or sporadic real-time tasks that need guarantees on their
131 timing behavior, e.g., multimedia, streaming, control applications, etc.
132
Luca Abeni6aaa1022015-05-18 15:00:32 +02001333.1 Definitions
134------------------------
135
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100136 A typical real-time task is composed of a repetition of computation phases
137 (task instances, or jobs) which are activated on a periodic or sporadic
138 fashion.
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200139 Each job J_j (where J_j is the j^th job of the task) is characterized by an
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100140 arrival time r_j (the time when the job starts), an amount of computation
141 time c_j needed to finish the job, and a job absolute deadline d_j, which
142 is the time within which the job should be finished. The maximum execution
Luca Abenic2a68492015-05-18 15:00:28 +0200143 time max{c_j} is called "Worst Case Execution Time" (WCET) for the task.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100144 A real-time task can be periodic with period P if r_{j+1} = r_j + P, or
145 sporadic with minimum inter-arrival time P is r_{j+1} >= r_j + P. Finally,
146 d_j = r_j + D, where D is the task's relative deadline.
Luca Abenie0deda82015-05-18 15:00:29 +0200147 Summing up, a real-time task can be described as
148 Task = (WCET, D, P)
149
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200150 The utilization of a real-time task is defined as the ratio between its
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100151 WCET and its period (or minimum inter-arrival time), and represents
152 the fraction of CPU time needed to execute the task.
153
Luca Abenic2a68492015-05-18 15:00:28 +0200154 If the total utilization U=sum(WCET_i/P_i) is larger than M (with M equal
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100155 to the number of CPUs), then the scheduler is unable to respect all the
156 deadlines.
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200157 Note that total utilization is defined as the sum of the utilizations
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100158 WCET_i/P_i over all the real-time tasks in the system. When considering
159 multiple real-time tasks, the parameters of the i-th task are indicated
160 with the "_i" suffix.
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200161 Moreover, if the total utilization is larger than M, then we risk starving
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100162 non- real-time tasks by real-time tasks.
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200163 If, instead, the total utilization is smaller than M, then non real-time
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100164 tasks will not be starved and the system might be able to respect all the
165 deadlines.
166 As a matter of fact, in this case it is possible to provide an upper bound
167 for tardiness (defined as the maximum between 0 and the difference
168 between the finishing time of a job and its absolute deadline).
169 More precisely, it can be proven that using a global EDF scheduler the
170 maximum tardiness of each task is smaller or equal than
171 ((M − 1) · WCET_max − WCET_min)/(M − (M − 2) · U_max) + WCET_max
Luca Abenic2a68492015-05-18 15:00:28 +0200172 where WCET_max = max{WCET_i} is the maximum WCET, WCET_min=min{WCET_i}
Luca Abeni134136c2015-05-18 15:00:30 +0200173 is the minimum WCET, and U_max = max{WCET_i/P_i} is the maximum
174 utilization[12].
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100175
Luca Abeni6aaa1022015-05-18 15:00:32 +02001763.2 Schedulability Analysis for Uniprocessor Systems
177------------------------
178
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100179 If M=1 (uniprocessor system), or in case of partitioned scheduling (each
180 real-time task is statically assigned to one and only one CPU), it is
181 possible to formally check if all the deadlines are respected.
182 If D_i = P_i for all tasks, then EDF is able to respect all the deadlines
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200183 of all the tasks executing on a CPU if and only if the total utilization
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100184 of the tasks running on such a CPU is smaller or equal than 1.
185 If D_i != P_i for some task, then it is possible to define the density of
Luca Abeni48355c42015-05-18 15:00:27 +0200186 a task as WCET_i/min{D_i,P_i}, and EDF is able to respect all the deadlines
Luca Abenie0deda82015-05-18 15:00:29 +0200187 of all the tasks running on a CPU if the sum of the densities of the tasks
188 running on such a CPU is smaller or equal than 1:
189 sum(WCET_i / min{D_i, P_i}) <= 1
190 It is important to notice that this condition is only sufficient, and not
191 necessary: there are task sets that are schedulable, but do not respect the
192 condition. For example, consider the task set {Task_1,Task_2} composed by
193 Task_1=(50ms,50ms,100ms) and Task_2=(10ms,100ms,100ms).
194 EDF is clearly able to schedule the two tasks without missing any deadline
195 (Task_1 is scheduled as soon as it is released, and finishes just in time
196 to respect its deadline; Task_2 is scheduled immediately after Task_1, hence
197 its response time cannot be larger than 50ms + 10ms = 60ms) even if
198 50 / min{50,100} + 10 / min{100, 100} = 50 / 50 + 10 / 100 = 1.1
199 Of course it is possible to test the exact schedulability of tasks with
200 D_i != P_i (checking a condition that is both sufficient and necessary),
201 but this cannot be done by comparing the total utilization or density with
202 a constant. Instead, the so called "processor demand" approach can be used,
203 computing the total amount of CPU time h(t) needed by all the tasks to
204 respect all of their deadlines in a time interval of size t, and comparing
205 such a time with the interval size t. If h(t) is smaller than t (that is,
206 the amount of time needed by the tasks in a time interval of size t is
207 smaller than the size of the interval) for all the possible values of t, then
208 EDF is able to schedule the tasks respecting all of their deadlines. Since
209 performing this check for all possible values of t is impossible, it has been
210 proven[4,5,6] that it is sufficient to perform the test for values of t
211 between 0 and a maximum value L. The cited papers contain all of the
212 mathematical details and explain how to compute h(t) and L.
213 In any case, this kind of analysis is too complex as well as too
214 time-consuming to be performed on-line. Hence, as explained in Section
215 4 Linux uses an admission test based on the tasks' utilizations.
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100216
Luca Abeni6aaa1022015-05-18 15:00:32 +02002173.3 Schedulability Analysis for Multiprocessor Systems
218------------------------
219
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100220 On multiprocessor systems with global EDF scheduling (non partitioned
221 systems), a sufficient test for schedulability can not be based on the
Luca Abeni134136c2015-05-18 15:00:30 +0200222 utilizations or densities: it can be shown that even if D_i = P_i task
223 sets with utilizations slightly larger than 1 can miss deadlines regardless
224 of the number of CPUs.
225
226 Consider a set {Task_1,...Task_{M+1}} of M+1 tasks on a system with M
227 CPUs, with the first task Task_1=(P,P,P) having period, relative deadline
228 and WCET equal to P. The remaining M tasks Task_i=(e,P-1,P-1) have an
229 arbitrarily small worst case execution time (indicated as "e" here) and a
230 period smaller than the one of the first task. Hence, if all the tasks
231 activate at the same time t, global EDF schedules these M tasks first
232 (because their absolute deadlines are equal to t + P - 1, hence they are
233 smaller than the absolute deadline of Task_1, which is t + P). As a
234 result, Task_1 can be scheduled only at time t + e, and will finish at
235 time t + e + P, after its absolute deadline. The total utilization of the
236 task set is U = M · e / (P - 1) + P / P = M · e / (P - 1) + 1, and for small
237 values of e this can become very close to 1. This is known as "Dhall's
238 effect"[7]. Note: the example in the original paper by Dhall has been
239 slightly simplified here (for example, Dhall more correctly computed
240 lim_{e->0}U).
241
242 More complex schedulability tests for global EDF have been developed in
243 real-time literature[8,9], but they are not based on a simple comparison
244 between total utilization (or density) and a fixed constant. If all tasks
245 have D_i = P_i, a sufficient schedulability condition can be expressed in
246 a simple way:
247 sum(WCET_i / P_i) <= M - (M - 1) · U_max
248 where U_max = max{WCET_i / P_i}[10]. Notice that for U_max = 1,
249 M - (M - 1) · U_max becomes M - M + 1 = 1 and this schedulability condition
250 just confirms the Dhall's effect. A more complete survey of the literature
251 about schedulability tests for multi-processor real-time scheduling can be
252 found in [11].
253
254 As seen, enforcing that the total utilization is smaller than M does not
255 guarantee that global EDF schedules the tasks without missing any deadline
256 (in other words, global EDF is not an optimal scheduling algorithm). However,
257 a total utilization smaller than M is enough to guarantee that non real-time
258 tasks are not starved and that the tardiness of real-time tasks has an upper
259 bound[12] (as previously noted). Different bounds on the maximum tardiness
260 experienced by real-time tasks have been developed in various papers[13,14],
261 but the theoretical result that is important for SCHED_DEADLINE is that if
262 the total utilization is smaller or equal than M then the response times of
263 the tasks are limited.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100264
Luca Abeni6aaa1022015-05-18 15:00:32 +02002653.4 Relationship with SCHED_DEADLINE Parameters
266------------------------
267
Luca Abeni78740852015-05-18 15:00:31 +0200268 Finally, it is important to understand the relationship between the
269 SCHED_DEADLINE scheduling parameters described in Section 2 (runtime,
270 deadline and period) and the real-time task parameters (WCET, D, P)
271 described in this section. Note that the tasks' temporal constraints are
272 represented by its absolute deadlines d_j = r_j + D described above, while
273 SCHED_DEADLINE schedules the tasks according to scheduling deadlines (see
274 Section 2).
275 If an admission test is used to guarantee that the scheduling deadlines
276 are respected, then SCHED_DEADLINE can be used to schedule real-time tasks
277 guaranteeing that all the jobs' deadlines of a task are respected.
278 In order to do this, a task must be scheduled by setting:
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100279
280 - runtime >= WCET
281 - deadline = D
282 - period <= P
283
Luca Abeni3aa2dbe2015-05-18 15:00:26 +0200284 IOW, if runtime >= WCET and if period is <= P, then the scheduling deadlines
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100285 and the absolute deadlines (d_j) coincide, so a proper admission control
286 allows to respect the jobs' absolute deadlines for this task (this is what is
287 called "hard schedulability property" and is an extension of Lemma 1 of [2]).
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +0100288 Notice that if runtime > deadline the admission control will surely reject
289 this task, as it is not possible to respect its temporal constraints.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100290
291 References:
292 1 - C. L. Liu and J. W. Layland. Scheduling algorithms for multiprogram-
293 ming in a hard-real-time environment. Journal of the Association for
294 Computing Machinery, 20(1), 1973.
295 2 - L. Abeni , G. Buttazzo. Integrating Multimedia Applications in Hard
296 Real-Time Systems. Proceedings of the 19th IEEE Real-time Systems
297 Symposium, 1998. http://retis.sssup.it/~giorgio/paps/1998/rtss98-cbs.pdf
298 3 - L. Abeni. Server Mechanisms for Multimedia Applications. ReTiS Lab
Luca Abeniad67dc32014-09-09 10:57:12 +0100299 Technical Report. http://disi.unitn.it/~abeni/tr-98-01.pdf
Luca Abenie0deda82015-05-18 15:00:29 +0200300 4 - J. Y. Leung and M.L. Merril. A Note on Preemptive Scheduling of
301 Periodic, Real-Time Tasks. Information Processing Letters, vol. 11,
302 no. 3, pp. 115-118, 1980.
303 5 - S. K. Baruah, A. K. Mok and L. E. Rosier. Preemptively Scheduling
304 Hard-Real-Time Sporadic Tasks on One Processor. Proceedings of the
305 11th IEEE Real-time Systems Symposium, 1990.
306 6 - S. K. Baruah, L. E. Rosier and R. R. Howell. Algorithms and Complexity
307 Concerning the Preemptive Scheduling of Periodic Real-Time tasks on
308 One Processor. Real-Time Systems Journal, vol. 4, no. 2, pp 301-324,
309 1990.
Luca Abeni134136c2015-05-18 15:00:30 +0200310 7 - S. J. Dhall and C. L. Liu. On a real-time scheduling problem. Operations
311 research, vol. 26, no. 1, pp 127-140, 1978.
312 8 - T. Baker. Multiprocessor EDF and Deadline Monotonic Schedulability
313 Analysis. Proceedings of the 24th IEEE Real-Time Systems Symposium, 2003.
314 9 - T. Baker. An Analysis of EDF Schedulability on a Multiprocessor.
315 IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems, vol. 16, no. 8,
316 pp 760-768, 2005.
317 10 - J. Goossens, S. Funk and S. Baruah, Priority-Driven Scheduling of
318 Periodic Task Systems on Multiprocessors. Real-Time Systems Journal,
319 vol. 25, no. 2–3, pp. 187–205, 2003.
320 11 - R. Davis and A. Burns. A Survey of Hard Real-Time Scheduling for
321 Multiprocessor Systems. ACM Computing Surveys, vol. 43, no. 4, 2011.
322 http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/~robdavis/papers/MPSurveyv5.0.pdf
323 12 - U. C. Devi and J. H. Anderson. Tardiness Bounds under Global EDF
324 Scheduling on a Multiprocessor. Real-Time Systems Journal, vol. 32,
325 no. 2, pp 133-189, 2008.
326 13 - P. Valente and G. Lipari. An Upper Bound to the Lateness of Soft
327 Real-Time Tasks Scheduled by EDF on Multiprocessors. Proceedings of
328 the 26th IEEE Real-Time Systems Symposium, 2005.
329 14 - J. Erickson, U. Devi and S. Baruah. Improved tardiness bounds for
330 Global EDF. Proceedings of the 22nd Euromicro Conference on
331 Real-Time Systems, 2010.
332
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100333
3344. Bandwidth management
335=======================
336
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100337 As previously mentioned, in order for -deadline scheduling to be
338 effective and useful (that is, to be able to provide "runtime" time units
339 within "deadline"), it is important to have some method to keep the allocation
340 of the available fractions of CPU time to the various tasks under control.
341 This is usually called "admission control" and if it is not performed, then
342 no guarantee can be given on the actual scheduling of the -deadline tasks.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100343
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100344 As already stated in Section 3, a necessary condition to be respected to
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200345 correctly schedule a set of real-time tasks is that the total utilization
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100346 is smaller than M. When talking about -deadline tasks, this requires that
347 the sum of the ratio between runtime and period for all tasks is smaller
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200348 than M. Notice that the ratio runtime/period is equivalent to the utilization
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100349 of a "traditional" real-time task, and is also often referred to as
350 "bandwidth".
351 The interface used to control the CPU bandwidth that can be allocated
352 to -deadline tasks is similar to the one already used for -rt
Juri Lelli0d9ba8b2014-09-09 10:57:13 +0100353 tasks with real-time group scheduling (a.k.a. RT-throttling - see
354 Documentation/scheduler/sched-rt-group.txt), and is based on readable/
355 writable control files located in procfs (for system wide settings).
356 Notice that per-group settings (controlled through cgroupfs) are still not
357 defined for -deadline tasks, because more discussion is needed in order to
358 figure out how we want to manage SCHED_DEADLINE bandwidth at the task group
359 level.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100360
Juri Lelli0d9ba8b2014-09-09 10:57:13 +0100361 A main difference between deadline bandwidth management and RT-throttling
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100362 is that -deadline tasks have bandwidth on their own (while -rt ones don't!),
Juri Lelli0d9ba8b2014-09-09 10:57:13 +0100363 and thus we don't need a higher level throttling mechanism to enforce the
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100364 desired bandwidth. In other words, this means that interface parameters are
365 only used at admission control time (i.e., when the user calls
366 sched_setattr()). Scheduling is then performed considering actual tasks'
367 parameters, so that CPU bandwidth is allocated to SCHED_DEADLINE tasks
368 respecting their needs in terms of granularity. Therefore, using this simple
369 interface we can put a cap on total utilization of -deadline tasks (i.e.,
370 \Sum (runtime_i / period_i) < global_dl_utilization_cap).
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100371
3724.1 System wide settings
373------------------------
374
375 The system wide settings are configured under the /proc virtual file system.
376
Juri Lelli0d9ba8b2014-09-09 10:57:13 +0100377 For now the -rt knobs are used for -deadline admission control and the
Luca Abeni3a3a58d2015-05-18 15:00:25 +0200378 -deadline runtime is accounted against the -rt runtime. We realize that this
Juri Lelli0d9ba8b2014-09-09 10:57:13 +0100379 isn't entirely desirable; however, it is better to have a small interface for
380 now, and be able to change it easily later. The ideal situation (see 5.) is to
381 run -rt tasks from a -deadline server; in which case the -rt bandwidth is a
382 direct subset of dl_bw.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100383
384 This means that, for a root_domain comprising M CPUs, -deadline tasks
385 can be created while the sum of their bandwidths stays below:
386
387 M * (sched_rt_runtime_us / sched_rt_period_us)
388
389 It is also possible to disable this bandwidth management logic, and
390 be thus free of oversubscribing the system up to any arbitrary level.
391 This is done by writing -1 in /proc/sys/kernel/sched_rt_runtime_us.
392
393
3944.2 Task interface
395------------------
396
397 Specifying a periodic/sporadic task that executes for a given amount of
398 runtime at each instance, and that is scheduled according to the urgency of
399 its own timing constraints needs, in general, a way of declaring:
400 - a (maximum/typical) instance execution time,
401 - a minimum interval between consecutive instances,
402 - a time constraint by which each instance must be completed.
403
404 Therefore:
405 * a new struct sched_attr, containing all the necessary fields is
406 provided;
407 * the new scheduling related syscalls that manipulate it, i.e.,
408 sched_setattr() and sched_getattr() are implemented.
409
410
4114.3 Default behavior
412---------------------
413
414 The default value for SCHED_DEADLINE bandwidth is to have rt_runtime equal to
415 950000. With rt_period equal to 1000000, by default, it means that -deadline
416 tasks can use at most 95%, multiplied by the number of CPUs that compose the
417 root_domain, for each root_domain.
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100418 This means that non -deadline tasks will receive at least 5% of the CPU time,
419 and that -deadline tasks will receive their runtime with a guaranteed
420 worst-case delay respect to the "deadline" parameter. If "deadline" = "period"
421 and the cpuset mechanism is used to implement partitioned scheduling (see
422 Section 5), then this simple setting of the bandwidth management is able to
423 deterministically guarantee that -deadline tasks will receive their runtime
424 in a period.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100425
Luca Abenib56bfc62014-09-09 10:57:14 +0100426 Finally, notice that in order not to jeopardize the admission control a
427 -deadline task cannot fork.
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100428
4295. Tasks CPU affinity
430=====================
431
432 -deadline tasks cannot have an affinity mask smaller that the entire
433 root_domain they are created on. However, affinities can be specified
seokhoon.yoon09c3bcc2016-08-02 23:23:57 +0900434 through the cpuset facility (Documentation/cgroup-v1/cpusets.txt).
Dario Faggioli712e5e32014-01-27 12:20:15 +0100435
4365.1 SCHED_DEADLINE and cpusets HOWTO
437------------------------------------
438
439 An example of a simple configuration (pin a -deadline task to CPU0)
440 follows (rt-app is used to create a -deadline task).
441
442 mkdir /dev/cpuset
443 mount -t cgroup -o cpuset cpuset /dev/cpuset
444 cd /dev/cpuset
445 mkdir cpu0
446 echo 0 > cpu0/cpuset.cpus
447 echo 0 > cpu0/cpuset.mems
448 echo 1 > cpuset.cpu_exclusive
449 echo 0 > cpuset.sched_load_balance
450 echo 1 > cpu0/cpuset.cpu_exclusive
451 echo 1 > cpu0/cpuset.mem_exclusive
452 echo $$ > cpu0/tasks
453 rt-app -t 100000:10000:d:0 -D5 (it is now actually superfluous to specify
454 task affinity)
455
4566. Future plans
457===============
458
459 Still missing:
460
461 - refinements to deadline inheritance, especially regarding the possibility
462 of retaining bandwidth isolation among non-interacting tasks. This is
463 being studied from both theoretical and practical points of view, and
464 hopefully we should be able to produce some demonstrative code soon;
465 - (c)group based bandwidth management, and maybe scheduling;
466 - access control for non-root users (and related security concerns to
467 address), which is the best way to allow unprivileged use of the mechanisms
468 and how to prevent non-root users "cheat" the system?
469
470 As already discussed, we are planning also to merge this work with the EDF
471 throttling patches [https://lkml.org/lkml/2010/2/23/239] but we still are in
472 the preliminary phases of the merge and we really seek feedback that would
473 help us decide on the direction it should take.
Juri Lellif5801932014-09-09 10:57:15 +0100474
475Appendix A. Test suite
476======================
477
478 The SCHED_DEADLINE policy can be easily tested using two applications that
479 are part of a wider Linux Scheduler validation suite. The suite is
480 available as a GitHub repository: https://github.com/scheduler-tools.
481
482 The first testing application is called rt-app and can be used to
483 start multiple threads with specific parameters. rt-app supports
484 SCHED_{OTHER,FIFO,RR,DEADLINE} scheduling policies and their related
485 parameters (e.g., niceness, priority, runtime/deadline/period). rt-app
486 is a valuable tool, as it can be used to synthetically recreate certain
487 workloads (maybe mimicking real use-cases) and evaluate how the scheduler
488 behaves under such workloads. In this way, results are easily reproducible.
489 rt-app is available at: https://github.com/scheduler-tools/rt-app.
490
491 Thread parameters can be specified from the command line, with something like
492 this:
493
494 # rt-app -t 100000:10000:d -t 150000:20000:f:10 -D5
495
496 The above creates 2 threads. The first one, scheduled by SCHED_DEADLINE,
497 executes for 10ms every 100ms. The second one, scheduled at SCHED_FIFO
498 priority 10, executes for 20ms every 150ms. The test will run for a total
499 of 5 seconds.
500
501 More interestingly, configurations can be described with a json file that
502 can be passed as input to rt-app with something like this:
503
504 # rt-app my_config.json
505
506 The parameters that can be specified with the second method are a superset
507 of the command line options. Please refer to rt-app documentation for more
508 details (<rt-app-sources>/doc/*.json).
509
510 The second testing application is a modification of schedtool, called
511 schedtool-dl, which can be used to setup SCHED_DEADLINE parameters for a
512 certain pid/application. schedtool-dl is available at:
513 https://github.com/scheduler-tools/schedtool-dl.git.
514
515 The usage is straightforward:
516
517 # schedtool -E -t 10000000:100000000 -e ./my_cpuhog_app
518
519 With this, my_cpuhog_app is put to run inside a SCHED_DEADLINE reservation
520 of 10ms every 100ms (note that parameters are expressed in microseconds).
521 You can also use schedtool to create a reservation for an already running
522 application, given that you know its pid:
523
524 # schedtool -E -t 10000000:100000000 my_app_pid
Juri Lelli13924d22014-09-09 10:57:16 +0100525
526Appendix B. Minimal main()
527==========================
528
529 We provide in what follows a simple (ugly) self-contained code snippet
530 showing how SCHED_DEADLINE reservations can be created by a real-time
531 application developer.
532
533 #define _GNU_SOURCE
534 #include <unistd.h>
535 #include <stdio.h>
536 #include <stdlib.h>
537 #include <string.h>
538 #include <time.h>
539 #include <linux/unistd.h>
540 #include <linux/kernel.h>
541 #include <linux/types.h>
542 #include <sys/syscall.h>
543 #include <pthread.h>
544
545 #define gettid() syscall(__NR_gettid)
546
547 #define SCHED_DEADLINE 6
548
549 /* XXX use the proper syscall numbers */
550 #ifdef __x86_64__
551 #define __NR_sched_setattr 314
552 #define __NR_sched_getattr 315
553 #endif
554
555 #ifdef __i386__
556 #define __NR_sched_setattr 351
557 #define __NR_sched_getattr 352
558 #endif
559
560 #ifdef __arm__
561 #define __NR_sched_setattr 380
562 #define __NR_sched_getattr 381
563 #endif
564
565 static volatile int done;
566
567 struct sched_attr {
568 __u32 size;
569
570 __u32 sched_policy;
571 __u64 sched_flags;
572
573 /* SCHED_NORMAL, SCHED_BATCH */
574 __s32 sched_nice;
575
576 /* SCHED_FIFO, SCHED_RR */
577 __u32 sched_priority;
578
579 /* SCHED_DEADLINE (nsec) */
580 __u64 sched_runtime;
581 __u64 sched_deadline;
582 __u64 sched_period;
583 };
584
585 int sched_setattr(pid_t pid,
586 const struct sched_attr *attr,
587 unsigned int flags)
588 {
589 return syscall(__NR_sched_setattr, pid, attr, flags);
590 }
591
592 int sched_getattr(pid_t pid,
593 struct sched_attr *attr,
594 unsigned int size,
595 unsigned int flags)
596 {
597 return syscall(__NR_sched_getattr, pid, attr, size, flags);
598 }
599
600 void *run_deadline(void *data)
601 {
602 struct sched_attr attr;
603 int x = 0;
604 int ret;
605 unsigned int flags = 0;
606
607 printf("deadline thread started [%ld]\n", gettid());
608
609 attr.size = sizeof(attr);
610 attr.sched_flags = 0;
611 attr.sched_nice = 0;
612 attr.sched_priority = 0;
613
614 /* This creates a 10ms/30ms reservation */
615 attr.sched_policy = SCHED_DEADLINE;
616 attr.sched_runtime = 10 * 1000 * 1000;
617 attr.sched_period = attr.sched_deadline = 30 * 1000 * 1000;
618
619 ret = sched_setattr(0, &attr, flags);
620 if (ret < 0) {
621 done = 0;
622 perror("sched_setattr");
623 exit(-1);
624 }
625
626 while (!done) {
627 x++;
628 }
629
630 printf("deadline thread dies [%ld]\n", gettid());
631 return NULL;
632 }
633
634 int main (int argc, char **argv)
635 {
636 pthread_t thread;
637
638 printf("main thread [%ld]\n", gettid());
639
640 pthread_create(&thread, NULL, run_deadline, NULL);
641
642 sleep(10);
643
644 done = 1;
645 pthread_join(thread, NULL);
646
647 printf("main dies [%ld]\n", gettid());
648 return 0;
649 }