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Broadened support for software and system model interchange

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Abstract

Although sound performance analysis theories and techniques exist, they are not widely used because they require extensive expertise in performance modeling and measurement. The overall goal of our work is to make performance modeling more accessible by automating much of the modeling effort. We have proposed a model interoperability framework that enables performance models to be automatically exchanged among modeling (and other) tools. The core of the framework is a set of model interchange formats (MIF): a common representation for data required by performance modeling tools. Our previous research developed a representation for system performance models (PMIF) and another for software performance models (S-PMIF), both based on the Queueing Network Modeling (QNM) paradigm. In order to manage the research scope and focus on model interoperability issues, the initial MIFs were limited to QNMs that can be solved by efficient, exact solution algorithms. The overall model interoperability approach has now been demonstrated to be viable. This paper broadens the scope of PMIF and S-PMIF to represent models that can be solved with additional methods such as analytical approximations or simulation solutions. It presents the extensions considered, describes the extended meta-models, and provides verification with examples and a case study.

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Notes

  1. We opted not to change the name to QueueingNetworkModelPlus so that previous models are still compatible with this meta-model.

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Acknowledgements

Smith’s participation was sponsored by US Air Force Contract FA8750-15-C-0171 Case number 88ABW-2016-3702.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departament de Ciències Matemàtiques i Informàtica, Universitat de les Illes Balears, Ctra de Valldemossa, Km. 7.6, 07071, Palma de Mallorca, Spain

    Catalina M. Lladó

  2. Software Performance Engineering, 2028 E. Ben White Blvd. 240-1321, Austin, TX, 78741, USA

    Connie U. Smith

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Correspondence to Catalina M. Lladó.

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Communicated by Dr Jeff Gray.

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Appendices

A S-PMIF+ specification for the CommandProcess scenario

figure e
Table 9 PMIF meta-model differences
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Table 10 SPMIF meta-model differences
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B Comparison of the meta-model versions

Table 9 shows the comparison of PMIF2 and PMIF+ versions, with respect to entities, references and attributes. Apart from the arcs that were taken out from PMIF2 since they are only needed for the graphical representation of QNMs, the rest of the changes are extensions in PMIF+ w.r.t PMIF. WorkUnitServiceRequest is taken out in PMIF+ but it can be expressed as a ServiceRequestPlus, therefore we removed it to avoid duplication.

Earlier versions of S-PMIF required each scenario to be assigned to one facility. S-PMIF+ no longer has this requirement so this is implemented with several changes:

  • Both Facility and OverheadMatrix are now optional,

  • The reference from scenario to facility has been removed; there is a reference from ServiceSpec to Server instead,

  • A reference from Server to Project relaxes the previous requirement that Server must be a child of Facility,

  • A reference from the new element CalculatedService to SoftwareResourceRequirement makes explicit when the OverheadMatrix is used to calculate the ServiceSpec.

Some other minor details related to the OverheadMatrix were discovered and corrected. They do not change the content of the OverheadMatrix only its representation so they are not covered in detail here.

SchedulingPolicy was extended to allow additional policies such as round robin, last-come first-served and others. Table 10 gives details of the changes between the different versions.

Table 11 MIF features supported by tools
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C MIF feature interoperability

Table 11 shows features supported by various tools. A D for the feature means the corresponding tool directly supports that feature. For example, CSIM [49] has a primitive called buffer that has the same behavior as defined in Sect. 3.1. An I indicates that it is possible to represent the defined behavior with other features provided by the tool. For example, CSIM does not have a primitive operation called join, but it is possible to implement the behavior by using an event that is set by individual workloads as they complete. An N indicates that the feature is not currently supported by the tool. The 3 shown for “Phases” indicates tools that support exactly 3 phases, not unlimited as in the definition.

All tools provide for ProbabilityDistributions and queue SchedulingPolicies in addition to the basic ones that can be solved by efficient, exact solution algorithms, but there is a significant difference in what is supported among tools. Thus, the transformation or import of distributions and scheduling policies must make substitutions for specifications that are not supported. Of course, the model solution is likely to differ among tools that do not have the same model specifications. It is still useful to compare solutions, and it may be possible to determine how much the specification affects performance (when there are not many differences). It is also possible to automatically move from a tool that does not support the desired specification to one that does to quantify its benefit.

Note that all new features are supported by one or more tools, and most of them are supported by multiple tools. Other than distributions or scheduling policies, we did not find modeling features in other tools not considered in the MIF extensions.

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Lladó, C.M., Smith, C.U. Broadened support for software and system model interchange. Softw Syst Model 18, 3527–3550 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10270-019-00728-x

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