SI2-SSE: A Unified Software Environment to Best Utilize Cache and Memory Systems on Multicores

Ohio State University, The, Columbus OH

Investigators

Abstract

This project further develops and maintains a set of system and application software to benefit application users of multicores by providing a unified software environment where multicore system utilities can be easily used as common functions in various applications. The project consists of the following three tasks. First, we further improve our cache-partitioning OS utility, and make efforts to add two other critical system utilities: (1) Multicore buffer cache management to prevent the shared cache from thrashing and pollution; (2) multicore-aware synchronization lock management to effectively make process assignments such that the co-running processes would minimize bandwidth consumption within a multicore chip and cross multiple multicore chips. Second, we continue our efforts to develop a software runtime library that enables programmers to explicitly manage and optimize the shared cache usage and memory accesses by allocating proper cache space and memory modules for different data sets of different processes. Finally, we provide a unified software environment for application users. With a set of easy interface functions, the users can access both middleware runtime library and the system utilities without a requirement of knowing architectural and system details. The broader and transformative impact of the project can be significant: (1) Our software will provide effective and accessible solutions for significant performance improvement in multicores for a large scope of application community. (2) Gaining the insights into system interactions among applications, OS, and multicore architecture, we will provide valuable guidance for designs and implementations of application software. (3) The software is online with a maintenance for a public, wide, and sustained usage, which will directly impact open source software, and contribute to application users. (4) The research and software development of the project will train both undergraduate and graduate students for their future technical innovations in academia and industries.