Power-Aware Scheduling under Timing Constraints and Slack Analysis for Mission-Critical Embedded Systems
Jinfeng Liu, Pai H. Chou, Nader Bagherzadeh, Fadi Kurdahi · 2001
Power-aware systems are those that must make the best use of available power. They subsume traditional low-power systems in that they must not only minimize power when the budget is low, but also deliver higher performance when required. This paper presents a new scheduling technique for supporting the design and evaluation to a class of power-aware systems in mission critical applications. It computes a schedule that satisfies stringent min/max timing and max power constraints at all times. Furthermore, it also makes the best effort to satisfy min power constraint in an attempt to fully utilize free solar power or to control power jitter. Experimental results show that our automated technique yields designs that improve performance and reduce energy cost simultaneously compared to hand-crafted designs used in previous missions. This tool forms the basis of the IMPACCT system-level framework that will enable designers to aggressively explore many more power-performance trade-offs with confidence.