Trustworthy Systems

Power measurement as the basis for power management

Authors

David C. Snowdon, Stefan M. Petters and Gernot Heiser

NICTA
Sydney
Australia

School of Computer Science and Engineering
UNSW
Sydney
Australia

Abstract

Energy has become a critical component of computer system design, particularly in the embedded space where the source of energy is often finite. While hardware design has the more significant effect on the system's power consumption, well designed system and application software make an important contribution to controlling the energy consumed.

In order to optimise software systems to reduce energy consumption, feedback is required. Traditional techniques rely heavily on models of the system which have various disadvantages. We examine the benefits of using live power measurements using statistical sampling for both off-line and on-line feedback on application power consumption. A hardware platform is manufactured, operating system modifications made, and extensive validation carried out. We conclude that the idea shows promise and justifies further investigation.

BibTeX Entry

  @inproceedings{Snowdon_PH_05,
    address          = {Palma, Mallorca, Spain},
    author           = {David C. Snowdon and Stefan M. Petters and Gernot Heiser},
    booktitle        = {Workshop on Operating System Platforms for Embedded Real-Time Applications (OSPERT)},
    month            = jul,
    paperurl         = {https://trustworthy.systems/publications/papers/Snowdon_PH_05.pdf},
    title            = {Power measurement as the basis for power management},
    year             = {2005}
  }

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