Self-Adapting Backfilling Scheduling for Parallel Systems

We focus on non-FCFS job scheduling policies for parallel systems that allow jobs to backfill, i.e., to move ahead in the queue, given that they do not delay certain previously submitted jobs. Consistent with commercial schedulers that maintain multiple queues where jobs are assigned according to the user-estimated duration, we propose a self-adapting backfilling policy that maintains multiple job queues to separate short from long jobs. The proposed policy adjusts its configuration parameters by continuously monitoring the system and quickly reacting to sudden fluctuations in the workload arrival pattern and/or severe changes in resource demands. Detailed performance comparisons via simulation using actual Supercomputing traces from the Parallel Workload Archive indicate that the proposed policy consistently outperforms traditional backfilling.