Analysis of a general limited scheduling mechanism for a distributed communication system

This paper studies an alternative scheduling mechanism of general limited service discipline for a distributed communication system, where the distributed system has a modular architecture and the module has tasks in the queue. We successfully analyze the system by way of imbedded Markov chains and use a recursive method to derive the mean waiting time of task. The arrival processes for modules are assumed to be Poisson processes; the service time of a task in queues and the walking time between queues are assumed to be generally distributed. We also presents an optimal-pattern design of the general limited scheduling mechanism for the distributed communication system via a genetic algorithm. A distributed communication system, if designed with the general limited scheduling mechanism and its optimal pattern, can be flexible to meet the system requirements as much as possible. q 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.