Resource manager architecture with dynamic resource allocation among multiple configurations

• US 7,284,244 B1
• Filed: 05/02/2000
• Issued: 10/16/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 05/02/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: McDowell, Sean C., Jones, Michael B., Sather, Dale A., Sankaranarayan, Mukund, Srinivasan, Jai, Raffman, Andy R.
• Primary Examiner(s): BULLOCK JR, LEWIS ALEXANDER
• Application Number:
  US09/565,284
• Time in Patent Office: 2,723 Days
• Field of Search: 718/104, 718/103, 709223-226
• US Class Current: 718/104
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5027 the resource being a machine, e.g. CPUs, Servers, Terminals

Abstract

Resource management architectures implemented in computer systems to manage resources are described. In one embodiment, a general architecture includes a resource manager and multiple resource providers that support one or more resource consumers such as a system component or application. Each provider is associated with a resource and acts as the manager for the resource when interfacing with the resource manager. The resource manager arbitrates access to the resources provided by the resource providers on behalf of the consumers. A policy manager sets various policies that are used by the resource manager to allocate resources. One policy is a priority-based policy that distinguishes among which applications and/or users have priority over others to use the resources. A resource consumer creates an “activity” at the resource manager and builds one or more “configurations” that describe various sets of preferred resources required to perform the activity. Each resource consumer can specify one or more configurations for each activity. If multiple configurations are specified, the resource consumer can rank them according to preference. This allows the resource consumers to be dynamically changed from one configuration to another as operating conditions change.

Claims

1. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

multiple resource providers associated with resources;

multiple consumers that utilize the resources provided by the resource providers to perform associated tasks, at least one of the consumers specifying a first configuration that identifies a first set of one or more resources to perform a task and a second configuration that identifies a second set of one or more resources to perform the task; and

a resource manager to arbitrate access to the resources provided by the resource providers on behalf of the consumers, the resource manager changing said one consumer from the first configuration to the second configuration to permit reallocation of at least portions of the resources among the consumers;

wherein the resource providers prevent the consumers from using the resources until the resources are reserved through the resource manager.

2. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein at least one of the consumers comprises an application program.

3. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein at least one resource provider acts as a consumer of a resource provided by at least one other resource provider.

4. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein the consumers submit requests to reserve the resources to the resource manager.

5. The resource management architecture of claim 4, wherein the resource providers prevent the consumers from using the resources without first reserving the resources with the submitted requests.

6. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein each of the resource providers comprises a resource quantifier that determines an amount of the associated resource that is available for allocation.

7. The resource management architecture of claim 6, wherein the resource quantifier comprises a counter that maintains a count of how many of the resources are available for allocation.

8. The resource management architecture of claim 6, wherein the resource quantifier comprises a temporal tracking component that tracks a duration that the resources is available for allocation.

9. The resource management architecture of claim 6, wherein the resource quantifier comprises a percentage tracking component that tracks a percentage of the resources that is available for allocation.

10. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein the resource manager exposes an application program interface, the resource providers and the consumers making calls to the resource manager via the application program interface.

11. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein the resource manager allocates the resources to the consumers according to a priority-based policy in which higher priority consumers are given precedence over lower priority consumers.

12. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein the first and second configurations each contains a set of one or more resource descriptors, each descriptor being an instance of a corresponding resource.

13. The resource management architecture of claim 12, wherein said each descriptor holds data including an identity of a resource provider associated with the resource and a quantity of the resource needed to perform the task.

14. The resource management architecture of claim 1, further comprising a policy manager to establish an allocation policy, the resource manager using the allocation policy to arbitrate access to the resources.

15. The resource management architecture of claim 1, further comprising an interface component to request a set of one or more of the resources on behalf of the consumers, the interface component submitting requests to the resource manager.

16. The resource management architecture of claim 1, wherein the resource providers are configured without any knowledge of real time, further comprising a scheduling component to schedule allocation of a set of the resources at a later time.

17. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

multiple resource providers associated with resources;

multiple consumers that utilize the resources provided by the resource providers to perform associated tasks;

a resource manager to arbitrate access to the resources provided by the resource providers on behalf of the consumers using one or more communications with the resource providers;

one of the consumers creating an activity at the resource manager in association with a task to be performed and building multiple configurations for the activity, each configuration identifying a set of one or more of the resources to perform the task; and

the resource manager being configured to reserve resources that satisfy at least one of the configurations and to subsequently switch the activity from said one configuration to another of the configurations to reallocate particular resources to or away from the activity.

18. The resource management architecture of claim 17, wherein the resource manager is configured to switch from said one configuration to said another configuration automatically.

19. The resource management architecture of claim 17, wherein the configurations are ranked in order of preference, the resource manager being configured to switch the activity from a more preferred configuration to a less preferred configuration.

20. The resource management architecture of claim 17, wherein the configurations are ranked in order of preference and the configuration with reserved resources is not highest ranked among the configurations, wherein the resource manager sends an upgrade notification to said one consumer when resources for a higher ranked configuration becomes available.

21. The resource management architecture of claim 20, wherein said one consumer, in response to the upgrade notification, requests the resource manager to reserve the resources for the higher ranked configuration.

22. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

multiple resource providers that are associated with resources;

a resource manager to allocate the resources provided by the resource providers to one or more consumers;

at least one activity data structure created at the resource manager in association with a task to be performed by a corresponding consumer;

multiple configuration data structures created at the resource manager in association with the activity data structure, each configuration data structure describing a set of one or more resources used to perform the associated activity; and

the resource manager being configured to switch among the configuration data structures of the associated activity data structure to change which of the resources are allocated to the consumer corresponding to the activity data structure and configured to interact with at least a portion of the multiple resource providers;

wherein at least one resource provider acts as a consumer of a resource provided by at least one other resource provider.

23. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

multiple resource providers that are associated with resources;

a resource manager to allocate the resources provided by the resource providers to one or more consumers;

at least one activity data structure created at the resource manager in association with a task to be performed by a corresponding consumer;

multiple configuration data structures created at the resource manager in association with the activity data structure, each configuration data structure describing a set of one or more resources used to perform the associated activity; and

the resource manager being configured to switch among the configuration data structures of the associated activity data structure to change which of the resources are allocated to the consumer corresponding to the activity data structure and configured to interact with at least a portion of the multiple resource providers;

wherein after switching from a first configuration data structure to a second configuration data structure, the resource manager automatically reserves the set of resources specified in the second configuration data structure; and

wherein the resource manager notifies the consumer corresponding to the activity data structure when the resources specified in the first configuration data structure are once again available.

24. The resource management architecture of claim 23, wherein the consumer, in response to notification, requests the resource manager to reserve the resources specified in the first configuration data structure.

25. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

a resource manager to allocate resources among multiple consumers;

an existing activity associated with a task to be performed by a corresponding consumer, the existing activity having first and second configurations that specify first and second sets of one or more resources used to perform the task, at least one resource of the one or more resources including an attribute that is opaque to the resource manager;

the resource manager being configured to reserve the first set of systems resources specified in the first configuration of the existing activity;

a new activity associated with another task to be performed by a corresponding consumer, the new activity having at least one configuration that specifies a particular resource reserved in the first configuration of the existing activity; and

the resource manager being configured to change the existing activity from the first configuration to the second configuration so that at least part of the particular resource can be released from the existing activity for reservation to the new activity;

wherein the resource manager notifies the existing activity when the resources specified in the first configuration are once again available for reservation.

26. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

a resource manager to allocate resources among multiple consumers;

an existing activity associated with a task to be performed by a corresponding consumer, the existing activity having first and second configurations that specify first and second sets of one or more resources used to perform the task, at least one resource of the one or more resources including an attribute that is opaque to the resource manager;

the resource manager being configured to reserve the first set of systems resources specified in the first configuration of the existing activity;

a new activity associated with another task to be performed by a corresponding consumer, the new activity having at least one configuration that specifies a particular resource reserved in the first configuration of the existing activity; and

the resource manager being configured to change the existing activity from the first configuration to the second configuration so that at least part of the particular resource can be released from the existing activity for reservation to the new activity;

wherein the resource manager automatically changes the existing activity from the second configuration back to the first configuration when the resources specified in the first configuration are once again available for reservation.

27. A resource management architecture implemented with at least a computing unit, the resource management architecture comprising:

a resource manager to allocate resources among multiple consumers according to priorities in conjunction with multiple resource providers that are associated with the resources, the resource manager adapted to expose application programming interfaces for interacting with the multiple consumers and the multiple resource providers;

a low priority activity associated with a task to be performed by a corresponding consumer, the low priority activity having multiple configurations that specify sets of one or more resources used to perform the task, the configurations being ranked in order of preference;

the resource manager being configured to reserve the set of resources specified in a high ranked configuration of the low priority activity;

a high priority activity associated with another task to be performed by a corresponding consumer, the high priority activity having at least one configuration that specifies a particular resource reserved in the high ranked configuration of the low priority activity; and

the resource manager being configured to downgrade the low priority activity from the high ranked configuration to a lower ranked configuration so that at least part of the particular resource can be reallocated from the low priority activity to the high priority activity.

28. The resource management architecture of claim 27, wherein the resource manager is configured to downgrade the low priority activity automatically.

29. The resource management architecture of claim 27, wherein the resource manager notifies the low priority activity of the downgrade.

30. The resource management architecture of claim 27, wherein the resource manager notifies the low priority activity when the set of resources specified in the higher ranked configuration are once again available for reservation.

31. A method comprising:

receiving a request from a first consumer to reserve resources to perform a task;

establishing, for the first consumer, multiple alternate configurations of the resources that may be utilized to perform the task using, at least partially, resource providers that are associated with the resources;

reserving the resources specified in one of the configurations for allocation to the first consumer;

receiving a request from a second consumer to reserve a set of one or more resources including at least one common resource that is already reserved for the first consumer;

shifting the first consumer from said one configuration to another configuration to free at least part of the common resource for reservation for allocation to the second consumer; and

switching from said another configuration back to said one configuration when more of the common resource becomes available.

32. A method comprising:

creating a new activity in association with a task to be performed;

building multiple configurations for the new activity each configuration identifying a different set of one or more resources used to perform the task, the configurations being ranked in order of preference;

evaluating a current allocation of the resources among existing activities by calling an accumulator function of each respective resource provider of multiple resource providers that are respectively associated with the resources; and

reserving the set of one or more resources specified in a highest ranking configuration;

wherein an existing activity or another new activity requests a resource identified in the highest ranking configuration, and further comprising downgrading from the highest ranking configuration to a lower ranking configuration to free at least part of the requested resource for allocation to the existing activity or the other new activity; and

wherein said existing or other new activity subsequently releases at least part of the requested resource, and further comprising notifying the new activity that a higher ranking configuration is available.

33. A method comprising:

creating a new activity in association with a task to be performed;

building multiple configurations for the new activity, each configuration identifying a different set of one or more resources used to perform the task, the configurations being ranked in order of preference;

evaluating a current allocation of the resources among existing activities by calling an accumulator function of each respective resource provider of multiple resource providers that are respectively associated with the resources; and

reserving the set of one or more resources specified in a highest ranking configuration;

wherein an existing activity or another new activity requests a resource identified in the highest ranking configuration, and further comprising downgrading from the highest ranking configuration to a lower ranking configuration to free at least part of the requested resource for allocation to the existing activity or the other new activity; and

wherein said existing or other new activity subsequently releases the requested resource, and further comprising upgrading from the lower ranking configuration to the highest ranking configuration to once again reserve more of the requested resource.

34. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions that, when executed, direct a computing device to:

reserve, for a first consumer, resources specified in one of multiple configurations for allocation to the first consumer;

receive a request from a second consumer to reserve a set of one or more resources including at least one common resource that is already reserved for the first consumer;

trace dependent resources from the common resource to another resource that is associated with a resource provider known to the first consumer;

notify, by the resource provider, the first consumer that the common resource is being preempted; and

shift the first consumer from said one configuration to another configuration to free the common resource for reservation for allocation to the second consumer.

35. An operating system embodied on the computer-readable medium of claim 34 and comprising the computer-executable instructions.

36. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions that, when executed, direct a computing device to:

create a new activity in association with a task to be performed;

build multiple configurations for the new activity, each configuration identifying a different set of one or more resources in a manner that indicates inter-resource relationships used to perform the task, the configurations being ranked in order of preference;

reserve the set of one or more resources specified in a highest ranking configuration; and

in an event that one of the resources specified in the highest ranking configuration is required by another activity, shift to a lower ranking configuration that does not specify the required resource to thereby release the required resource for allocation to said another activity.

37. An operating system embodied on the computer-readable medium of claim 36 and comprising the computer-executable instructions.