Predicting Disk Scheduling Performance with Virtual Machines

Abstract : A method for predicting the performance of disk scheduling algorithms on real machines using only their performance on virtual machines is suggested. The method uses a dynamically loaded kernel intercept probe (iprobe) to adjust low-level virtual device timing to match that of a simple model derived from the real device. An example is provided in which the performance of a newly proposed disk scheduling algorithm is compared with that of standard Linux algorithms. The advantage of the proposed method is that reasonable performance predictions may be made without dedicated measurement platforms and with only relatively limited knowledge of the performance characteristics of the targeted devices.