Chapter 4: Threads

• Overview
• Multicore Programming
• Multithreading Models
• Thread Libraries
• Implicit Threading
• Threading Issues
• Operating System Examples
Objectives
• To introduce the notion of a thread—a
fundamental unit of CPU utilization that forms
the basis of multithreaded computer systems
• To discuss the APIs for the Pthreads, Windows,
and Java thread libraries
• To explore several strategies that provide
implicit threading
• To examine issues related to multithreaded
programming
• To cover operating system support for threads
in Windows and Linux
Motivation
• Most modern applications are multithreaded
• Threads run within application
• Multiple tasks with the application can be
implemented by separate threads
• Update display
• Fetch data
• Spell checking
• Answer a network request
• Process creation is heavy-weight while thread
creation is light-weight
• Can simplify code, increase efficiency
• Kernels are generally multithreaded
Multithreaded Server Architecture
Benefits

• Responsiveness – may allow continued execution

if part of process is blocked, especially important
for user interfaces
• Resource Sharing – threads share resources of
process, easier than shared memory or message
passing
• Economy – cheaper than process creation, thread
switching lower overhead than context switching
• Scalability – process can take advantage of
multiprocessor architectures
Multicore Programming
• Multicore or multiprocessor systems putting pressure
on programmers, challenges include:
• Dividing activities
• Balance
• Data splitting
• Data dependency
• Testing and debugging
• Parallelism implies a system can perform more than
one task simultaneously
• Concurrency supports more than one task making
progress
• Single processor / core, scheduler providing concurrency
 Multicore Programming (Cont.)

• Types of parallelism
• Data parallelism – distributes subsets of the same
data across multiple cores, same operation on
each
• Task parallelism – distributing threads across
cores, each thread performing unique operation
• As # of threads grows, so does architectural
support for threading
• CPUs have cores as well as hardware threads
• Consider Oracle SPARC T4 with 8 cores, and 8
hardware threads per core
 Concurrency vs. Parallelism
 Concurrent execution on single-core system:

 Parallelism on a multi-core system:

Single and Multithreaded Processes
Amdahl’s Law
• Identifies performance gains from adding additional cores to an application
that has both serial and parallel components
• S is serial portion
• N processing cores

• That is, if application is 75% parallel / 25% serial, moving from 1 to 2 cores
results in speedup of 1.6 times
• As N approaches infinity, speedup approaches 1 / S

Serial portion of an application has disproportionate effect on

performance gained by adding additional cores

• But does the law take into account contemporary multicore systems?
 User Threads and Kernel Threads

• User threads - management done by user-level threads library

• Three primary thread libraries:
• POSIX Pthreads
• Windows threads
• Java threads
• Kernel threads - Supported by the Kernel
• Examples – virtually all general purpose operating systems, including:
• Windows
• Solaris
• Linux
• Tru64 UNIX
• Mac OS X
 Multithreading Models

• Many-to-One

• One-to-One

• Many-to-Many
Many-to-One
• Many user-level threads mapped
to single kernel thread
• One thread blocking causes all to
block
• Multiple threads may not run in
parallel on muticore system
because only one may be in kernel
at a time
• Few systems currently use this
model
• Examples:
• Solaris Green Threads
• GNU Portable Threads
One-to-One
• Each user-level thread maps to kernel
thread
• Creating a user-level thread creates a
kernel thread
• More concurrency than many-to-one
• Number of threads per process
sometimes restricted due to overhead
• Examples
• Windows
• Linux
• Solaris 9 and later
Many-to-Many Model
• Allows many user level
threads to be mapped to
many kernel threads
• Allows the operating
system to create a sufficient
number of kernel threads
• Solaris prior to version 9
• Windows with the
ThreadFiber package
Two-level Model
• Similar to M:M, except that it allows a
user thread to be bound to kernel thread
• Examples
• IRIX
• HP-UX
• Tru64 UNIX
• Solaris 8 and earlier
Thread Libraries

• Thread library provides programmer with

API for creating and managing threads
• Two primary ways of implementing
• Library entirely in user space
• Kernel-level library supported by the OS
Pthreads

• May be provided either as user-level or

kernel-level
• A POSIX standard (IEEE 1003.1c) API for
thread creation and synchronization
• Specification, not implementation
• API specifies behavior of the thread library,
implementation is up to development of the
library
• Common in UNIX operating systems (Solaris,
Linux, Mac OS X)
Pthreads Example
PthreadsPthreads
Example (Cont.)
Example (Cont.)
 Pthreads Code for Joining 10 Threads

Operating System Concepts – 9 th Edition 4. 21 Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013

Windows Multithreaded C Program
Windows Multithreaded C Program (Cont.)
Java Threads
• Java threads are managed by the JVM
• Typically implemented using the threads model provided
by underlying OS
• Java threads may be created by:

• Extending Thread class

• Implementing the Runnable interface
Java Multithreaded Program
Java Multithreaded Program (Cont.)
Implicit Threading
• Growing in popularity as numbers of threads
increase, program correctness more difficult with
explicit threads
• Creation and management of threads done by
compilers and run-time libraries rather than
programmers
• Three methods explored
• Thread Pools
• OpenMP
• Grand Central Dispatch
• Other methods include Microsoft Threading Building
Blocks (TBB), java.util.concurrent package
Thread Pools
• Create a number of threads in a pool where
they await work
• Advantages:
• Usually slightly faster to service a request with an
existing thread than create a new thread
• Allows the number of threads in the application(s)
to be bound to the size of the pool
• Separating task to be performed from mechanics
of creating task allows different strategies for
running task
• i.e.Tasks could be scheduled to run periodically
• Windows API supports thread pools:
OpenMP
• Set of compiler directives and an API
for C, C++, FORTRAN
• Provides support for parallel
programming in shared-memory
environments
• Identifies parallel regions – blocks of
code that can run in parallel
#pragma omp parallel
Create as many threads as there are
cores
#pragma omp parallel for
for(i=0;i<N;i++) {
c[i] = a[i] + b[i];
}
Run for loop in parallel
Grand Central Dispatch

• Apple technology for Mac OS X and iOS operating

systems
• Extensions to C, C++ languages, API, and run-time
library
• Allows identification of parallel sections
• Manages most of the details of threading
• Block is in “^{ }” - ˆ{ printf("I am a
block"); }
• Blocks placed in dispatch queue
• Assigned to available thread in thread pool when
removed from queue
Grand Central Dispatch
• Two types of dispatch queues:
• serial – blocks removed in FIFO order, queue is per
process, called main queue
• Programmers can create additional serial queues within
program
• concurrent – removed in FIFO order but several
may be removed at a time
• Three system wide queues with priorities low, default,
high
Threading Issues
• Semantics of fork() and exec() system calls
• Signal handling
• Synchronous and asynchronous
• Thread cancellation of target thread
• Asynchronous or deferred
• Thread-local storage
• Scheduler Activations
 Semantics of fork() and exec()

• Does fork()duplicate only the calling

thread or all threads?
• Some UNIXes have two versions of fork
• exec() usually works as normal –
replace the running process including all
threads
 Signal Handling
 Signals are used in UNIX systems to notify a
process that a particular event has occurred.
 A signal handler is used to process signals
1. Signal is generated by particular event
2. Signal is delivered to a process
3. Signal is handled by one of two signal handlers:
1. default
2. user-defined
 Every signal has default handler that kernel
runs when handling signal
 User-defined signal handler can override default
 For single-threaded, signal delivered to process
 Signal Handling (Cont.)
 Where should a signal be delivered for
multi-threaded?
 Deliver the signal to the thread to which the
signal applies
 Deliver the signal to every thread in the
process
 Deliver the signal to certain threads in the
process
 Assign a specific thread to receive all signals
for the process
 Thread Cancellation
• Terminating a thread before it has finished
• Thread to be canceled is target thread
• Two general approaches:
• Asynchronous cancellation terminates the target
thread immediately
• Deferred cancellation allows the target thread to
periodically check if it should be cancelled
• Pthread code to create and cancel a thread:
 Thread Cancellation (Cont.)
• Invoking thread cancellation requests cancellation, but
actual cancellation depends on thread state

• If thread has cancellation disabled, cancellation remains

pending until thread enables it
• Default type is deferred
• Cancellation only occurs when thread reaches cancellation point
• I.e. pthread_testcancel()
• Then cleanup handler is invoked
• On Linux systems, thread cancellation is handled through
signals
Thread-Local Storage

• Thread-local storage (TLS) allows each thread

to have its own copy of data
• Useful when you do not have control over the
thread creation process (i.e., when using a
thread pool)
• Different from local variables
• Local variables visible only during single function
invocation
• TLS visible across function invocations
• Similar to static data
• TLS is unique to each thread
 Scheduler Activations
• Both M:M and Two-level models require
communication to maintain the appropriate
number of kernel threads allocated to the
application
• Typically use an intermediate data structure
between user and kernel threads –
lightweight process (LWP)
• Appears to be a virtual processor on which
process can schedule user thread to run
• Each LWP attached to kernel thread
• How many LWPs to create?
• Scheduler activations provide upcalls - a
communication mechanism from the kernel
to the upcall handler in the thread library
• This communication allows an application to
maintain the correct number kernel threads
 Operating System Examples

• Windows Threads
• Linux Threads
Windows Threads
• Windows implements the Windows API –
primary API for Win 98, Win NT, Win 2000,
Win XP, and Win 7
• Implements the one-to-one mapping, kernel-
level
• Each thread contains
• A thread id
• Register set representing state of processor
• Separate user and kernel stacks for when thread
runs in user mode or kernel mode
• Private data storage area used by run-time
libraries and dynamic link libraries (DLLs)
• The register set, stacks, and private storage
area are known as the context of the thread
Windows Threads (Cont.)

• The primary data structures of a thread

include:
• ETHREAD (executive thread block) – includes
pointer to process to which thread belongs and
to KTHREAD, in kernel space
• KTHREAD (kernel thread block) – scheduling and
synchronization info, kernel-mode stack, pointer
to TEB, in kernel space
• TEB (thread environment block) – thread id,
user-mode stack, thread-local storage, in user
space
Windows Threads Data Structures
Linux Threads
• Linux refers to them as tasks rather than threads
• Thread creation is done through clone() system call
• clone() allows a child task to share the address
space of the parent task (process)
• Flags control behavior

• struct task_struct points to process data

structures (shared or unique)
 End of Chapter 4

Operating System Concepts – 9th Edition Silberschatz, Galvin and Gagne ©2013