CSR: Small: A Node OS for High-Performance Cloud Computing

该项目包括专门针对“云”数据中心中计算节点的操作系统（OS）的设计、实施和实验评估。 云计算提供了一个重新思考操作系统设计的机会，因为目标不是桌面系统，而是支持网络应用程序的大型集群的有效构建块。建议的操作系统在集群中充当“哑”节点，从外部集群管理器接收命令，并根据需要将资源分发给应用程序。这一点，加上使用相对较少的设备和没有图形用户界面，意味着它只需要支持传统操作系统功能的一小部分。相反，重点是多核高性能、性能隔离、远程控制和服务层。本项目中探索的操作系统机制有可能提高数据中心的效率，既可以提高单节点效率，又可以更轻松地利用未充分利用的节点进行批处理和大规模数据分析，而不会妨碍对延迟敏感的应用程序。为了产生更大的影响，该项目将把开发的操作系统的源代码作为免费的开源软件发布。专注于实现众核并行的操作系统的早期版本已经发布。新的操作系统具有潜在的教育用途，以及探索更高层次的集群操作系统的想法。此外，首席研究员将利用伯克利分校的SUPERB计划，为代表性不足的本科生带来为期8周的夏季研究经验。

This project encompasses design, implementation, and experimental evaluation of an operating system (OS) targeted specifically for compute nodes in "cloud" data centers. Cloud computing offers a chance to rethink OS design, as the goal is not a desktop system but rather an efficient building block for large clusters that support networked applications. The proposed OS acts as a "dumb" node in a cluster, taking commands from an external cluster manager and handing out resources to applications as appropriate. This, plus the use of relatively few devices and no graphical user interface, means it need only support a small fraction of traditional OS features. Instead the focus is on high performance with many cores, performance isolation, remote control, and tiers of service. The operating system mechanisms explored in this project have potential to improve data center efficiency, both by improving single-node efficiency, and by making it easier to leverage underutilized nodes for batch processing and large-scale data analysis without hindering latency-sensitive applications. For greater impact, the project will release the source code of the developed OS as free, open-source software. An earlier version of the operating system that focused on enabling many-core parallelism has already been released. The new OS has potential uses for education as well for exploring higher-level cluster OS ideas. In addition, the principal investigator will leverage Berkeley's SUPERB program to bring in underrepresented undergraduate students for an 8-week summer research experience.