Real-time performance analysis of multiprocessor systems with shared memory

Abstract

Predicting timing behavior is key to reliable real-time system design and verification, but becomes increasingly difficult for current multiprocessor systems on chip. The integration of formerly separate functionality into a single multicore system introduces new intercore timing dependencies resulting from the common use of the now shared resources. This feedback of system timing on local timing makes traditional performance analysis approaches inappropriate. This article presents a general methodology to model the shared resource traffic and consider its effect on the local task execution. The aggregate busy time captures the timing of multiple accesses to a shared memory far better than the traditional models that focus on the timing of individual events. An iterative approach is proposed to tackle the analysis dependencies that exist in systems with event-driven task activation and dynamic resource arbitration.