Architectural support for operating system-driven CMP cache management

The role of the operating system (OS) in managing shared resources such as CPU time, memory, peripherals, and even energy is well motivated and understood [23]. Unfortunately, one key resource—lower-level shared cache in chip multi-processors—is commonly managed purely in hardware by rudimentary replacement policies such as least-recentlyused (LRU). The rigid nature of the hardware cache management policy poses a serious problem since there is no single best cache management policy across all sharing scenarios. For example, the cache management policy for a scenario where applications from a single organization are running under “best effort” performance expectation is likely to be different from the policy for a scenario where applications from competing business entities (say, at a third party data center) are running under a minimum service level expectation. When it comes to managing shared caches, there is an inherent tension between flexibility and performance. On one...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: IEEEPACT
• Authors: Nauman Rafique, Won-Taek Lim, Mithuna Thottethodi
• Keywords: Cache, Cache Management Policy, Hardware, Hardware Cache, IEEEPACT 2006