Scheduling Policy Optimization in Kernel-Based Virtual Machine

Abstract

Scheduling policy in host operating system (OS) will have effect on the performance of Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM). This paper proposed an optimized scheduler policy to improve the performance of KVM. Firstly, a special process queue for virtual machine (VM) is added in the host OS, which is scheduled prior to normal process. Same time slices is given to each VM to make their load balanced. Secondly, the VM process queue is periodic sorted based on the remaining time slices of VM and a special state is added to identify I/O-intensive VM, which make sure that I/O-intensive VM is processed specially to receive a prior schedule opportunity. In the end, an experiment in KVM environment is designed and executed to show the effectiveness of this optimized scheduling policy.