Thread-related actions based on historical thread behaviors

• US 8,677,360 B2
• Filed: 05/12/2011
• Issued: 03/18/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 05/12/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: de Justo Teixeira, Pedro Miguel Sequeira, Kishan, Arun U.
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, VAN H
• Application Number:
  US13/106,627
• Publication Number:
  US 20120291033A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,041 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 718/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3404 for parallel or distributed programming
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3476 Data logging G06F11/14, G06F11/2205 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2201/865 Monitoring of software

Abstract

Various embodiments provide techniques for managing threads based on a thread history. In at least some embodiments, a behavior associated with currently existing threads is observed and a thread-related action is performed. A result of the thread-related action with respect to the currently existing threads, resources associated with the currently existing threads (e.g., hardware and/or data resources), and/or other threads, is then observed. A thread history is recorded (e.g., as part of a thread history database) that includes the behavior associated with the currently existing threads, the thread related action that was performed, and the result of the thread-related action. The thread history can include information about multiple different thread behaviors and can be referenced to determine whether to perform thread-related actions in response to other observed thread behaviors.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving, by a computer, an indication of a current thread behavior associated with an existing thread;

determining, by the computer, one or more attributes of the current thread behavior;

correlating, by the computer, the current thread behavior with one or more historical thread behaviors based at least in part on the one or more attributes; and

determining, by the computer, whether to perform a thread-related action based on a thread history associated with the one or more historical thread behaviors,

wherein the attributes of the current thread behavior comprise at least one or more of a blocking event associated with the current thread behavior, an application or process that requested the existing thread, or an identity of a resource that the existing thread is attempting to access,

wherein the correlating comprises matching the one or more attributes of the current thread behavior to one or more historical attributes of the one or more historical thread behaviors, and

wherein the thread-related action comprises one of causing one or more new threads to be created or preventing a new thread from being created.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the current thread behavior comprises one or more of a thread dependency chain, an internal thread dependency, an external thread dependency, or an alternate thread dependency.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the existing thread is part of a group of concurrently-executing threads and the current thread behavior is associated with the group of concurrently-executing threads.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the thread history includes an indication of a historical thread-related action associated with the one or more historical thread behaviors and a result of the historical thread-related action being performed.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein determining, by the computer, whether to perform the thread-related action comprises determining, based on the thread history, whether the thread-related action produced a favorable result or an unfavorable result when performed in response to the one or more historical thread behaviors.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

causing, by the computer, the thread-related action to be performed; and

recording, by the computer, a result of the thread-related action being performed as part of one or more of the thread history associated with the one or more historical thread behaviors or a thread history associated with the current thread behavior.

7. A computer-implemented method comprising:

observing, by a computer, a current thread behavior associated with one or more existing threads;

performing, by the computer, a thread-related action associated with the current thread behavior;

observing, by the computer, a result of the thread-related action;

recording, by the computer, the current thread behavior, the thread-related action, and the result of the thread-related action as a thread history,

receiving, by the computer, an indication of an additional thread behavior associated with one or more different threads;

determining one or more attributes of the additional thread behavior;

correlating, by the computer, the additional thread behavior to the current thread behavior based on matching one or more of the attributes of the additional thread behavior to attributes of the current thread behavior; and

determining, by the computer, whether to perform the thread-related action in response to the additional thread behavior based on an indication in the thread history of whether the thread-related action produced a favorable result or an unfavorable result when performed in response to the current thread behavior,

wherein the thread-related action comprises causing one or more new threads to be created or preventing a new thread from being created.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein observing, by the computer, the current thread behavior includes observing that the one or more existing threads are attempting to access one or more of a hardware resource or a data resource.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein observing, by the computer, the current thread behavior includes observing an application or other process associated with the one or more existing threads, the method further comprising recording an indication of the application or other process as part of the thread history.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the result of the thread-related action comprises one of an increase in thread throughput of a computing device or a decrease in thread throughput of the computing device.

11. One or more computer readable storage memories embodying computer readable instructions, the instructions executed by a processor to implement:

a thread manager configured to observe thread behaviors and determine whether to perform thread-related actions; and

a thread history configured to store attributes of the thread behaviors as observed by the thread manager, associate the thread behaviors with the thread-related actions, and enable the attributes of the thread behaviors to be searched to determine which of the thread-related actions are associated with particular instances of the thread behaviors,

wherein the thread history includes an indication of whether the thread-related actions produced favorable results or unfavorable results when performed,

wherein the thread history is searched to correlate a new thread behavior with one or more of the thread behaviors and the thread manager determines whether to perform one or more of the thread-related actions in response to the new thread behavior, and

wherein the thread-related actions comprise causing one or more new threads to be created or preventing a new thread from being created.

12. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 11, wherein one or more of the thread manager or the thread history are implemented within a kernel of an operating system of a computing device.

13. The one or more computer readable storage media of claim 11, wherein the attributes of the thread behaviors include one or more of a number of threads associated with a particular one of the thread behaviors, a hardware resource associated with the particular one of the thread behaviors, or an application associated with the particular one of the thread behaviors.