Analytical Evaluation of Round Robin Algorithm to Find the Optimal Quantum Size

Abstract

There are a number of scheduling algorithms used in computer systems today. They all have their own characteristics. Thus selection of the particular scheduling algorithm depends upon the need of the system. One of the most widely used scheduling algorithms in multi programming operating system is round robin. Primitive round robin scheduling algorithm is simply first-come first-served with preemption included. But, now a days, several variations exist for round robin scheduling algorithm. In this dissertation, as the title “An analytical evaluation of round robin scheduling algorithm to find the optimal quantum size” suggests, I am going to analyze the round robin scheduling algorithm. There exists different performance criteria to find the optimality of the quantum size but, here, I chose three of them, namely, processor utilization, turnaround time, and waiting time of the processes. To analyze the round robin algorithm, I simply implemented a simulation of an operating system which we call here a multi programming operating system [1]. Different programs are designed for the analysis purpose which we call here the workload. With the help of simulator and the workload, I analyzed the different performance criteria for different quantum sizes and, came to the conclusion for this dissertation work.