Threading Ch.4 Sections 1-3

parallel concurrent

A system is ___________ if it can perform more than one task simultaneously. In contrast, a ___________ system supports more than one task by allowing all the tasks to make progress. Thus, it is possible to have concurrency without parallelism. Concurrency is essentially when two tasks are being performed at the same time. This might mean that one is 'paused' for a short duration, while the other is being worked on. Importantly, a different task is begun before an ongoing task is completed. This makes it a multi-programming model. Parallelism requires that at least two processes/tasks are actively being performed at a particular moment in time. As illustrated by the metaphor above, this means that you require at least two 'processors' or 'workers'.

multicore multiprocessor

Earlier in the history of computer design, in response to the need for more computing performance, single-CPU systems evolved into multi-CPU systems. A more recent, similar trend in system design is to place multiple computing cores on a single chip. Each core appears as a separate processor to the operating system. Whether the cores appear across CPU chips or within CPU chips, we call these systems _________ or ___________ systems.

identifiying tasks balance data splitting data dependency testing and debugging

In general, five areas present challenges in programming for multicore systems: 1. ____________ - This involves examining applications to find areas that can be divided into separate, concurrent tasks. Ideally, tasks are independent of one another and thus can run in parallel on individual cores. 2. _____________ - While identifying tasks that can run in parallel, programmers must also ensure that the tasks perform equal work of equal value. In some instances, a certain task may not contribute as much value to the overall process as other tasks. Using a separate execution core to run that task may not be worth the cost. 3. _________ - Just as applications are divided into separate tasks, the data accessed and manipulated by the tasks must be divided to run on separate cores. 4. _________ - The data accessed by the tasks must be examined for dependencies between two or more tasks. When one task depends on data from another, programmers must ensure that the execution of the tasks is synchronized to accommodate the data dependency. 5. __________ - When a program is running in parallel on multiple cores, many different execution paths are possible. Testing and debugging such concurrent programs is inherently more difficult than testing and debugging single-threaded applications.

two-level

One variation on the many-to-many model still multiplexes many userlevel threads to a smaller or equal number of kernel threads but also allows a user-level thread to be bound to a kernel thread. This variation is sometimes referred to as the ____________ model.

many-to-one

The _______________ model maps many user-level threads to one kernel thread. Thread management is done by the thread library in user space, so it is efficient. However, the entire process will block if a thread makes a blocking system call. Also, because only one thread can access the kernel at a time, multiple threads are unable to run in parallel on multicore systems.

one-to-one

The ________________ model maps each user thread to a kernel thread. It provides more concurrency than the many-to-one model by allowing another thread to run when a thread makes a blocking system call. It also allows multiple threads to run in parallel on multiprocessors. The only drawback to this model is that creating a user thread requires creating the corresponding kernel thread. Because the overhead of creating kernel threads can burden the performance of an application, most implementations of this model restrict the number of threads supported by the system

many-to-many

The ________________ model multiplexes many user-level threads to a smaller or equal number of kernel threads. The number of kernel threads may be specific to either a particular application or a particular machine (an application may be allocated more kernel threads on a multiprocessor than on a single processor). Let's consider the effect of this design on concurrency. Whereas the many-to-one model allows the developer to create as many user threads as she wishes, it does not result in true concurrency, because the kernel can schedule only one thread at a time.

multithreaded programming

The following are benefits of what? Responsiveness - Multithreading an interactive application may allow a program to continue running even if part of it is blocked or is performing a lengthy operation, thereby increasing responsiveness to the user. This quality is especially useful in designing user interfaces. For instance, consider what happens when a user clicks a button that results in the performance of a time-consuming operation. A single-threaded application would be unresponsive to the user until the operation had completed. In contrast, if the time-consuming operation is performed in a separate thread, the application remains responsive to the user. Resource Sharing - Processes can only share resources through techniques such as shared memory and message passing. Such techniques must be explicitly arranged by the programmer. However, threads share the memory and the resources of the process to which they belong by default. The benefit of sharing code and data is that it allows an application to have several different threads of activity within the same address space. Economy - Allocating memory and resources for process creation is costly. Because threads share the resources of the process to which they belong, it is more economical to create and context-switch threads. Empirically gauging the difference in overhead can be difficult, but in general it is significantly more time consuming to create and manage processes than threads. In Solaris, for example, creating a process is about thirty times slower than is creating a thread, and context switching is about five times slower. Scalability - The benefits can be even greater in a multiprocessor architecture, where threads may be running in parallel on different processing cores. A single-threaded process can run on only one processor, regardless how many are available. We explore this issue further in the following section.

data parallelism task parallelism

There are 2 types of parallelism. ___________ focuses on distributing subsets of the same data across multiple computing cores and performing the same operation on each core. _____________ involves distributing not data but tasks (threads) across multiple computing cores. Each thread is performing a unique operation. Different threads may be operating on the same data, or they may be operating on different data.

thread

____1____ is a basic unit of CPU utilization; it comprises a thread ID, a program counter, a register set, and a stack. It shares with other threads belonging to the same process its code section, data section, and other operating-system resources, such as open files and signals. A traditional (or heavyweight) process has a single thread of control. If a process has multiple threads of control, it can perform more than one task at a time. Smallest sequence of programmed instructions that can be managed independently by a scheduler. A web browser might have one thread display images or text while another thread retrieves data from the network, for example. A word processor may have a thread for displaying graphics, another thread for responding to keystrokes from the user, and a third thread for performing spelling and grammar checking in the background.

user kernel

_______ threads are supported above the kernel and are managed without kernel support, whereas ________ threads are supported and managed directly by the operating system.

green threads

____________ —a thread library available for Solaris systems and adopted in early versions of Java—used the many-to-one model. However, very few systems continue to use the model because of its inability to take advantage of multiple processing cores.