Operating system distributed over heterogeneous platforms

• US 8,776,088 B2
• Filed: 03/30/2009
• Issued: 07/08/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 03/30/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Hodson, Orion T., Hunt, Galen C., Nightingale, Edmund B.
• Primary Examiner(s): DAO, TUAN C.
• Application Number:
  US12/413,619
• Publication Number:
  US 20100251265A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,926 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 719/319
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/462 Lookup
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/465 Distributed object oriented systems remote method invocation [RMI] G06F9/548
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4843 by program, e.g. task dispatcher, supervisor, operating system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5077 Logical partitioning of resources; Management or configuration of virtualized resources specific details on emulation or internal functioning of virtual machines G06F9/455
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/54 Interprogram communication
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/546 Message passing systems or structures, e.g. queues
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

An illustrative operating system distributes two or more instances of the operating system over heterogeneous platforms of a computing device. The instances of the operating system work together to provide single-kernel semantics to present a common operating system abstraction to application modules. The heterogeneous platforms may include co-processors that use different instruction set architectures and/or functionality, different NUMA domains, etc. Further, the operating system allows application modules to transparently access components using a local communication path and a remote communication path. Further, the operating system includes a policy manager module that determines the placement of components based on affinity values associated with interaction relations between components. The affinity values express the sensitivity of the interaction relations to a relative location of the components.

Claims

1. An operating system, comprising:

at least two instances of the operating system stored in computer readable memory and distributed among at least two different heterogeneous platforms within a computing device, the at least two different heterogeneous platforms comprising a first platform on a first substrate and a second platform on a second substrate different from the first substrate, the first platform comprising a first functionality and at least one application module configured to interact with the first platform via a first local communication path and with the second platform via a remote communication path, the second platform comprising a second functionality and at least one other application module configured to interact with the first platform via the remote communication path and with the second platform via a second local communication path, said at least two instances using single-kernel semantics, the single-kernel semantics presenting a common homogenous operating system abstraction to the at least one application module and the at least one other application module such that the first functionality and second functionality are available to the at least one application module and the at least one other application module in a manner transparent to the at least one application module, the at least one other application module, the first functionality, and the second functionality.

2. The operating system of claim 1, wherein the first platform uses a different instruction set architecture than the second platform.

3. The operating system of claim 1, wherein the first platform corresponds to a first non-uniform memory access (NUMA) domain and the second platform corresponds to a second NUMA domain.

4. The operating system of claim 1, wherein the first functionality comprises at least one of:

a central processing unit (CPU) or memory, and wherein the second functionality comprises at least one of;

a different CPU, different memory, a graphics processing unit (GPU), BIOS functionality, or processor cache coherency functionality.

5. The operating system of claim 1, wherein a first instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes a monolithic kernel providing at least one operating system monolithic kernel component configured to operate within a first single address space defined by the monolithic kernel.

6. The operating system of claim 5, wherein a second instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes:

a microkernel providing at least one operating system microkernel component configured to operate within a second single address space defined by the microkernel; and

one or more services providing at least one operating system service component configured to operate outside the second single address space.

7. The operating system of claim 1, wherein an instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes:

a microkernel providing at least one operating system microkernel component configured to operate within a single address space defined by the microkernel; and

one or more services providing at least one operating system service component configured to operate outside the single address space.

8. A computing device, comprising:

a first processor of a first platform executing a first operating system instance distributed on the first platform of the computing device, the first platform comprising first functionality on a first substrate; and

a second processor of a second platform executing a second operating system instance distributed on the second platform of the computing device, the second platform being different from the first platform and comprising second functionality on a second substrate, the first operating system instance and the second operating system instance being configured to present a common operating system abstraction to an application resident on the first platform such that the first functionality of the first platform is available to the application via a local communication path and the second functionality of the second platform is available to the application via a remote communication path in a manner transparent to the application, the first functionality, and the second functionality.

9. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the first platform uses a different instruction set architecture (ISA) than the second platform.

10. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the first functionality comprises at least one of:

a central processing unit (CPU) or memory, and wherein the second functionality comprises at least one of;

a different CPU, different memory, a graphics processing unit (GPU), BIOS functionality, or processor cache coherency functionality.

11. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the first platform and the second platform are communicatively linked via an input-output (I/O) bus or point-to-point connection.

12. The computing device of claim 8, wherein a first instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes a monolithic kernel providing at least one operating system monolithic kernel component configured to operate within a first single address space defined by the monolithic kernel.

13. The computing device of claim 12, wherein a second instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes:

a microkernel providing at least one operating system microkernel component configured to operate within a second single address space defined by the microkernel; and

one or more services providing at least one operating system service component configured to operate outside the second single address space.

14. A system comprising:

a first processor of a first platform on a computing device;

a second processor on a second platform on the computing device, the second platform being communicatively linked with the first platform; and

an operating system comprising a first operating system instance distributed on the first platform and a second operating system instance distributed on the second platform, the first operating system instance and second operating system instance being configured to present a common operating system abstraction to one or more applications resident on the first platform and configured to be implemented on the operating system such that functionality on the first platform is available to the one or more applications via a local communication path and other functionality on the second platform is available to the one or more applications via a remote communication path in a manner transparent to the one or more applications, the functionality and the other functionality.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein the first platform comprises at least one of the following on a first substrate:

a central processing unit (CPU) or memory.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the second platform comprises at least one of the following on a second substrate different from the first substrate:

a different CPU, different memory, a graphics processing unit (GPU), BIOS functionality, or processor cache coherency functionality.

17. The system of claim 14, wherein the second platform is communicatively linked with the first platform via an input-output (I/O) bus.

18. The system of claim 14, wherein a first instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes a monolithic kernel providing at least one operating system monolithic kernel component configured to operate within a first single address space defined by the monolithic kernel.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein a second instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes:

a microkernel providing at least one operating system microkernel component configured to operate within a second single address space defined by the microkernel; and

one or more services providing at least one operating system service component configured to operate outside the second single address space.

20. The system of claim 14, wherein an instance of the at least two instances of the operating system includes:

a microkernel providing at least one operating system microkernel component configured to operate within a single address space defined by the microkernel; and

one or more services providing at least one operating system service component configured to operate outside the single address space.