Hierarchical Resource Orchestration Framework for Real-Time Containers

Container-based virtualization is a promising deployment model in fog and edge computing applications, because it allows a seamless co-existence of virtualized applications in a heterogeneous environment without introducing significant overhead. Certain application domains (e.g., industrial automation, automotive, or aerospace) mandate that applications exhibit a certain degree of temporal predictability. Container-based virtualization cannot be easily used for such applications, since the technology is not designed to support real-time properties and handle temporal disturbances. This article proposes a framework consisting of a static offline and a dynamic online phase for resource allocation and adaptive re-dimensioning of real-time containers. In the offline phase, the optimal initial deployment and dimensioning of containers are decided based on ideal system models. Additionally, to adapt to dynamic variations caused by changing workloads or interferences, the online phase adapts the CPU usage and limits of real-time containers at runtime to improve the real-time behavior of the real-time containerized applications while optimizing resource usage. We implement the framework in a real Linux-based system and show through a series of experiments that the proposed framework is able to adjust and re-distribute computing resources between containers to improve the real-time behavior of containerized applications in the presence of temporal disturbances while optimizing resource usage.