A Real-Time Scratchpad-Centric OS for Multi-Core Embedded Systems

Rohan Tabish, Renato Mancuso, Saud Wasly, Ahmed Alhammad, Sujit S. Phatak, Rodolfo Pellizzoni, Marco Caccamo

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

Abstract

Multi-core processors have replaced single-core systems in almost every segment of the industry. Unfortunately, their increased complexity often causes a loss of temporal predictability which represents a key requirement for hard real-time systems. Major sources of unpredictability are the shared low level resources, such as the memory hierarchy and the I/O subsystem. In this paper, we approach the problem of shared resource arbitration at an OS-level and propose a novel scratchpad-centric OS design for multi-core platforms. In the proposed OS, the predictable usage of shared resources across multiple cores represents a central design-time goal. Hence, we show (i) how contention-free execution of real-time tasks can be achieved on scratchpad-based architectures, and (ii) how a separation of application logic and I/O perations in the time domain can be enforced. To validate the proposed design, we implemented the proposed OS using a commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) platform. Experiments show that this novel design delivers predictable temporal behavior to hard real-time tasks, and it improves performance up to 2.1x compared to traditional approaches.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publication2016 IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium, RTAS 2016 - Proceedings
PublisherInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
ISBN (Electronic)9781467386395
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 27 2016
EventIEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium, RTAS 2016 - Vienna, Austria
Duration: Apr 11 2016Apr 14 2016

Publication series

Name2016 IEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium, RTAS 2016 - Proceedings

Other

OtherIEEE Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium, RTAS 2016
Country/TerritoryAustria
CityVienna
Period4/11/164/14/16

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Hardware and Architecture

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