FINE-GRAINED CAPACITY MANAGEMENT OF COMPUTING ENVIRONMENTS THAT MAY SUPPORT A DATABASE

• US 20130086374A1
• Filed: 12/02/2011
• Published: 04/04/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Teradata Corporation
• Original Assignee: Teradata Corporation
• Inventors: Morris, John Mark, Muller, P. Keith, Brown, Douglas P.
• Granted Patent: US 9,766,933 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 713/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24569 Query processing with adaptation to specific hardware, e.g. adapted for using GPUs or SSDs
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/504 Resource capping
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5011 the resources being hardware resources other than CPUs, Servers and Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5044 considering hardware capabilities
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/505 considering the load
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

Computing capacity of a computing environment can be managed by controlling it associated processing capacity based on a target (or desired) capacity. In addition, fine-grained control over the processing capacity can be exercised. For example, a computing system can change the processing capacity (e.g., processing rate) of at least one processor operating based on a target capacity. The computing system may also be operable to change the processing capacity based on a measured processing capacity (e.g., a measured average of various processing rates of a processor taken over a period of time when a processor may have been operating at different processing rates over that period). By way of example, the processing rate of a processor can be switched between 1/8 and 2/8 of a maximum processing rate to achieve virtually any effective processing rates between them.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of managing computing capacity of a computing system in relation to a target capacity of the computing system, wherein the computing system includes at least one processor, and wherein the computer-implemented method comprises:

determining at least partly based on the target capacity of the computing system whether to change processing capacity of the at least one processor from a first processing capacity to a different processing capacity; and

changing the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a second processing capacity which is different than the first processing capacity when the determining determines to change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a different processing capacity.

2. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the determining of whether to change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a different processing capacity further comprises:

determining at least partly based on the target capacity of the computing system and a measured processing capacity of the at least one processor, whether to change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a different processing capacity, and

wherein the measured processing capacity includes a measurement of the processing capacity of the at least one processor over at least a first period of time.

3. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the computer-implemented method further comprises:

obtaining a first measurement of the processing rate of the at least one processor over a first period of time;

comparing the first measurement of the processing rate to a target processing rate associated with the target capacity of the computing system;

increasing or decreasing at least one current processing rate of the at least one processor based on the comparison of the first measurement of the processing rate to the target processing.

4. The computer-implemented of claim 3, wherein the computer-implemented method further comprises:

changing the processing rate of the at least one processor from a first processing rate to a second processing rate;

obtaining a second measurement of the of the processing rate of the at least one processor over a second period of time that include the time the at least one processor has been operating at the second processing rate since the processing rate was changed to the second processing rate;

comparing the second measurement of the processing rate to the target processing rate;

determining whether to switch the processing rate of the at least one processor from the second processing rate back to the first processing rate; and

switching the processing rate of the at least one processor from the second processing rate back to the first processing rate when the determining determines to switch the processing rate.

5. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the processing capacity includes a maximum processing rate indicative of maximum processing rate of the at least one processor.

6. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the maximum is at least one of:

an actual processing, and an effective processing rate achieved by skipping one or more actual clock cycles.

7. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the computing system includes a database system with the at least one processor operable to process data for a database, and wherein the changing of the processing capacity of the at least one processor is performed when the database system is processing the data for the database.

8. The computer-implemented of claim 7, wherein the changing of the processing capacity of the at least one processor is performed despite the demand for processing of data by the database.

9. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the changing of the processing capacity of the at least one processor causes the at least one processor to effectively operate over a second time period at a processing rate that is not configured for the at least one processor.

10. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the changing of the processing capacity of the at least one processor is made at least partly based on a measured average of the processing rates of the at least one processors over a second period of time when the at least one processor operates at two different processing rates.

11. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the computer-implemented method further comprises:

adjusting the target capacity of computing system.

12. The computer-implemented of claim 1,

wherein the computing system includes a database system, and

wherein the adjusting the target capacity of computing system comprises adjusting a target capacity of the database system by a value agreed upon by at least a customer and a vendor of the database system.

13. The computer-implemented of claim 1, wherein the computer-implemented method further comprises:

measuring the capacity of computing system.

14. The computer-implemented of claim 13,

wherein the computing system includes a database system, and

wherein the computer-implemented method further comprises billing cost of capacity of the database system to a customer of the database system.

15. A system that includes one or more processors, wherein the one or more processor are operable to:

determine at least partly based on a target capacity associated with a computing environment whether to change processing capacity of at least one processor in the computing environment from a first processing capacity to a different processing capacity; and

change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a second processing capacity which is different than the first processing capacity when the determining determines to change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a different processing capacity.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the one or more processor are further operable to:

determine at least partly based on the target capacity of the computing system and a measured processing capacity of the at least one processor, whether to change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a different processing capacity, and

wherein the measured processing capacity includes a measurement of the processing capacity of the at least one processor over at least a first period of time.

17. The system of claim 15, wherein the one or more processor are further operable to:

obtain a first measurement of the processing rate of the at least one processor over a first period of time;

compare the first measurement of the processing rate to a target processing rate associated with the target capacity of the computing system;

increase or decrease at least one current processing rate of the at least one processor based on the comparison of the first measurement of the processing rate to the target processing.

18. A non-transient computer readable storage medium storing at least excitable code operable to manage computing capacity of a computing system in relation to a target capacity of the computing system, wherein the computing system includes at least one processor, and wherein the executable code includes:

executable code that when executed determines at least partly based on the target capacity of the computing system whether to change processing capacity of the at least one processor from a first processing capacity to a different processing capacity; and

executable code that when executed changes the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a second processing capacity which is different than the first processing capacity when the determining determines to change the processing capacity of the at least one processor from the first processing capacity to a different processing capacity.

19. The non-transient computer readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the processing capacity includes a maximum processing rate indicative of maximum processing rate of the at least one processor.

20. The non-transient computer readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the maximum is at least one of:

an actual processing, and an effective processing rate achieved by skipping one or more actual clock cycles.