Question

Describe 2 methods to assign processes to processors in multiprocessing

Answer 1

One approach is when all the scheduling decisions and I/O processing are handled by a single processor which is called the Master Server and the other processors executes only the user code. This is simple and reduces the need of data sharing. This entire scenario is called Asymmetric Multiprocessing.

A second approach uses Symmetric Multiprocessing where each processor is self scheduling. All processes may be in a common ready queue or each processor may have its own private queue for ready processes. The scheduling proceeds further by having the scheduler for each processor examine the ready queue and select a process to execute.