HP UX 11i Workload Management (gWLM/WLM) Software manual How gWLM allocates CPU resources

For more information on these system divisions, visit:

•HP Matrix Operating Environment website: http://www.hp.com/go/matrixoe/integrity

•The “Technical Documentation website for HP Matrix Operating Environment” website: HP Enterprise Information Library

•The “Global Workload Manager” topic and the glossary in the online help for gWLM, available in gWLM’s graphical interface in System Insight Manager.

gWLM manages resources based on the following model:

1.You define an SRD by:

a.Deciding which of your systems you want to manage and what type of compartments you want to use.

gWLM manages existing nPars, vPars, VSPs, and virtual machines. It can manage your existing psets and fss groups as well as create new ones.

b.Associating each workload with a compartment.

For nPars, vPars, VSPs, and virtual machines, the compartment itself defines the workload. For psets and fss groups, you define the workload based on applications, users, or process IDs.

c.Associating a policy with the workload indicating how gWLM should allocate resources to the workload's compartment.

gWLM comes with several policies and also lets you define your own. You can use a single policy for multiple workloads, minimizing the number of policies, if desired.

2.Once the SRD is deployed:

a.gWLM monitors the CPU resource consumption of all the workloads in the SRD during the current allocation interval.

b.At the end of the interval, gWLM adjusts the CPU resource allocations for the compartments in accordance with the policies. It also makes the allocation data available for real-time and historical reports.

c.gWLM repeats the previous two substeps.

For information on what types of workloads to combine for optimal resource utilization, refer to the online help topic “Getting the Most Out of gWLM.”

How gWLM allocates CPU resources

gWLM addresses priority levels from highest to lowest, allocating resources to all requests at a given priority level before considering lower priority requests. If, at some priority level, all requests cannot be satisfied, the remaining resources are distributed so that the total resource allocation for each workload is as near the proportion of its weight relative to the sum of all the weights as possible. If gWLM has satisfied all resource requests at all priorities and there are resources still to be allocated, it will distribute the remaining resources by weight. Again, this is so that the total resource allocation for each workload is as near the proportion of its weight relative to the sum of all the weights as possible.

Table 1 lists the default weights for the various policy types. For policies with weights, you can also set the weight explicitly.

Table 1 Default weights by policy type

Policy type	Default weight
Fixed	N/A

10 Overview