Assist Thread Compilation for Multi-threaded Processors

下一代计算机将是多线程的，允许同时执行多个程序。大多数计算机工作负载很难重新转换成多线程形式，利用多线程功能。本研究研究了一种新的程序翻译方法：辅助线程。辅助线程是应用程序的专用版本，当作为独立线程运行时，（并优化）应用程序。辅助线程的角色包括程序分析、监视、预执行，和内存管理。实验表明，辅助线程可以有效地实现垃圾收集。辅助线程模仿应用程序的执行，跟踪内存访问，并在识别时回收未使用的内存。主应用程序线程忽略内存管理问题，变得更简单，其他种类的辅助线程在应用程序之前执行，预计算和预加载所需的数据值。它探讨了如何生成实现辅助线程所需的计算。本文还对多种辅助线程进行了实验，评估了它们的有效性和效率。总之，本研究为多处理器的应用开辟了新的途径，使它们更有效地支持各种计算机用户的需求。

The next generation of computers will be multi-threaded,allowing the simultaneous execution of several programs.Most computer workloads are difficult to recast intomulti-threaded form, under-utilizing multi-threading capabilities.This research studies a new approach to program translation:Assist Threads.An assist thread is a specialized version of an application program that,when run as an independent thread, assists (and optimizes) the application.Roles for assist threads include program profiling, monitoring, pre-execution,and memory management.Experiments show that assist threadscan effectively implement garbage collection.An assist thread mimics an application's execution,tracking memory accesses and recycling unused memory as it is recognized.The main application thread ignores memory management concerns,becoming simpler, faster and more reliable.Other varieties of assist threads execute slightly in advance of anapplication program, precomputing and preloading needed data values.This research makes both theoretical and practical contributions tocompiler technology. It explores how to generate the computationsnecessary to implement assist threads. It also experiments with a varietyof assist threads, evaluating their effectiveness and efficiency.In summary, this research opens new avenues of application for multi-threadedprocessors, making them more effective in supporting the needs of a widevariety of computer users.