Multi-threaded processes for opening and saving documents

• US 8,255,905 B2
• Filed: 06/27/2008
• Issued: 08/28/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Sudzilouski, Uladzislau, Zaika, Igor
• Primary Examiner(s): Alrobaye, Idriss N
• Application Number:
  US12/147,925
• Publication Number:
  US 20090327668A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,523 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 718/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/506 Constraint
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/509 Offload
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5038 considering the execution order of a plurality of tasks, e.g. taking priority or time dependency constraints into consideration scheduling strategies G06F9/4881 and subgroups

Abstract

Tools and techniques are described for multi-threaded processing for opening and saving documents. These tools may provide load processes for reading documents from storage devices, and for loading the documents into applications. These tools may spawn a load process thread for executing a given load process on a first processing unit, and an application thread may execute a given application on a second processing unit. A first pipeline may be created for executing the load process thread, with the first pipeline performing tasks associated with loading the document into the application. A second pipeline may be created for executing the application process thread, with the second pipeline performing tasks associated with operating on the documents. The tasks in the first pipeline are configured to pass tokens as input to the tasks in the second pipeline.

Claims

1. A computer-readable storage medium that is not a signal, the computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

provide a save process for writing at least one document from at least one application, and storing the document into at least one storage device;

spawn an application thread to execute the application on a first processing unit;

spawn a save process thread to execute the save process on at least a second processing unit;

spawn a first pipeline for executing the application thread, wherein the first pipeline is for performing a plurality of tasks associated with operating on at least the one document;

create at least a second pipeline for executing the save process thread, wherein the second pipeline is for performing a plurality of tasks associated with writing at least the one document to the storage device, wherein the tasks in the first pipeline are configured to pass tokens as input to the tasks in the second pipeline;

provide a circular queue to store tokens received from the first pipeline and to pass the tokens to the tasks in the second pipeline; and

providing at least one synchronization primitive for regulating access to the circular queue.

2. The storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions for spawning the save process thread include instructions for spawning the save process thread for executing on a first processing core provided by a multi-core central processing unit (CPU), and wherein the instructions for spawning the application thread include instructions for spawning the application thread for executing on a second processing core provided by the multi-core CPU.

3. The storage medium of claim 1, wherein the instructions for spawning the save process thread include instructions for spawning the save process thread for executing on a first processor provided by a multiprocessor system, and wherein the instructions for spawning the application thread include instructions for spawning the application thread for executing on a second processor provided by the multiprocessor system.

4. The storage medium of claim 1, wherein the tasks in the first pipeline operate separately and independently from the tasks in the second pipeline.

5. The storage medium of claim 1, wherein at least one of the tasks in the first pipeline operate in parallel with at least one of the tasks in the second pipeline.

6. The storage medium of claim 1, further comprising instructions for resolving at least one of the tokens to a string variable associated with storing the document.

7. The storage medium of claim 1, further comprising instructions for creating a third pipeline for executing the save process thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with writing the document to the storage device, wherein the tasks in the second pipeline are configured to pass tokens as input to the tasks in the third pipeline.

8. A method comprising:

providing, at a computer, a save process for writing a document from an application, and storing the document at a storage device;

spawning an application thread to execute the application on a first processing unit;

spawning a save process thread to execute the save process on a second processing unit;

spawning a first pipeline for executing the application thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with operating on the document;

creating a second pipeline for executing the save process thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with writing the document to the storage device, wherein the tasks in the first pipeline are configured to pass tokens as input to the tasks in the second pipeline;

providing a circular queue to receive the tokens from the tasks in the first pipeline and to pass the tokens to the tasks in the second pipeline; and

providing a synchronization primitive to regulate access to the circular queue.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein spawning the save process thread comprises spawning the save process thread on a first processing core provided by a multi-core central processing unit, and wherein spawning the application thread comprises spawning the application thread on a second processing core provided by the multi-core central processing unit.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein spawning the save process thread comprises spawning the save process thread on a first processor, and wherein spawning the application thread comprises spawning the application thread on a second processor.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein the tasks in the first pipeline operate separately and independently from the tasks in the second pipeline.

12. The method of claim 8, wherein at least one of the tasks in the first pipeline operates in parallel with at least one of the tasks in the second pipeline.

13. The method of claim 8, further comprising resolving at least one of the tokens to a string variable associated with storing the document.

14. The method of claim 8, further comprising creating a third pipeline for executing the save process thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with writing the document to the storage device, wherein the tasks in the second pipeline are configured to pass tokens as input to the tasks in the third pipeline.

15. A computer storage medium that is not a signal, the computer storage medium having computer executable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

provide a save process for writing a document from an application;

store the document at a storage device;

spawn an application thread to execute the application on a first processing unit;

spawn a save process thread to execute the save process on a second processing unit;

create a first pipeline for executing the application thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with operating on the document;

create a second pipeline for executing the save process thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with writing the document to the storage device, wherein the tasks in the first pipeline are configured to pass tokens to the tasks in the second pipeline;

provide a circular queue to receive the tokens from the tasks in the first pipeline and to pass the tokens to the tasks in the second pipeline; and

provide a synchronization primitive to regulate access to the circular queue.

16. The computer storage medium of claim 15, wherein spawning the save process thread comprises spawning the save process thread on a first processing core, and wherein spawning the application thread comprises spawning the application thread on a second processing core.

17. The computer storage medium of claim 15, wherein spawning the save process thread comprises spawning the save process thread on a first processor, and wherein spawning the application thread comprises spawning the application thread on a second processor.

18. The computer storage medium of claim 15, wherein the tasks in the first pipeline operate independently from the tasks in the second pipeline.

19. The computer storage medium of claim 15, wherein at least one of the tasks in the first pipeline operates in parallel with at least one of the tasks in the second pipeline.

20. The computer storage medium of claim 15, further comprising computer executable instructions that, when executed by the computer, cause the computer to create a third pipeline for executing the save process thread and for performing a plurality of tasks associated with writing the document to the storage device, wherein the tasks in the second pipeline are configured to pass tokens as input to the tasks in the third pipeline.