Mechanism for on-line prediction of future performance measurements in a computer system

• US 7,072,805 B2
• Filed: 10/17/2003
• Issued: 07/04/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 10/17/2003
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Duesterwald, Evelyn, Dwarkadas, Sandhya, Cascaval, Gheorghe C.
• Primary Examiner(s): Barlow, John
• Assistant Examiner(s): LE, JOHN H
• Application Number:
  US10/688,293
• Publication Number:
  US 20050086029A1
• Time in Patent Office: 991 Days
• Field of Search: 702/35, 702/182, 702/190, 702/196, 706/20, 706/21, 703/6, 717/131, 704/275, 395/586
• US Class Current: 702/196
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/206 comprising thermal management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3203 Power management, i.e. event-based initiation of a power-saving mode
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/329 by task scheduling
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/008 Reliability or availability analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3419 by assessing time
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3447 Performance evaluation by modeling
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3452 Performance evaluation by statistical analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/88 Monitoring involving counting
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/5019 Workload prediction
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4881 Scheduling strategies for dispatcher, e.g. round robin, multi-level priority queues
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

Disclosed are a method and system for predicting future values of a target metric associated with a task executed on a computer system. The method includes the steps of, over a given period of time, measuring at least one defined metric, transforming that measurement into a value for a predictor source metric, and using the value for the predictor source metric to obtain a predicted future value for said target metric. The preferred embodiment of this invention provides a flexible performance multi-predictor to solve the problem of providing accurate future behavior predictions for adaptive reconfiguration systems. The multi-predictor makes predictions about future workload characteristic by periodically reading available hardware counters. Also disclosed is a method and system for periodically reconfiguring an adaptive computer system by rescheduling tasks based on future behavior predictions.

Claims

1. A method of predicting future values of a target metric associated with a task executed on a computer system, comprising the steps:

over a given period of time, measuring at least one defined metric;

transforming said measurement into a value for a predictor source metric; and

using the value for the predictor source metric to obtain a predicted future value for said target metric;

wherein the using step includes the step of providing a set of possible future values, including the steps of;

i) identifying values that the target metric had at different times;

ii) for each of said identified values of the target metric, determining the value that the source metric had before the time at which the target metric had the identified value; and

iii) using said identified values of the target metric as the possible future values.