Low Latency Kernel veya Hard Real Time Kernel

Giriş
Low Latency Kernel ve Generic Kernel arasındaki farkın açıklaması şöyle.

RT kernels add a number of patches to the mainline kernel, and a few more configuration tweaks. The purpose of most of those patches is to allow more opportunities for pre-emption, by removing or splitting up locks, and to reduce the amount of time the kernel spends handling uninterruptible tasks (notably, by improving the logging mechanisms and using them less). The goal of all this is to allow the kernel to meet deadlines, i.e. ensure that, when it is required to handle something, it isn’t busy doing something else; this isn’t the same as high throughput or low latency, but fixing latency issues helps.

The generic kernels, as configured by default in most distributions, are designed to be a “sensible” compromise: they try to ensure that no single task can monopolise the system for too long, and that tasks can switch reasonably frequently, but without compromising throughput — because the more time the kernel spends considering whether to switch tasks (inside or outside the kernel), or handling interrupts, the less time the system as a whole can spend “working”. That compromise isn’t good enough for latency-sensitive workloads such as real-time audio or video processing: for those, low-latency kernels provide lower latencies at the expense of some throughput. And for real-time requirements, the real-time kernels remove as many low-latency-blockers as possible, at the expense of more throughput.

Low Latency Kernel Ayarları
Açıklaması şöyle.

Compared to the generic configuration, the low-latency kernel changes the following settings:

- IRQs are threaded by default, meaning that more IRQs (still not all IRQs) can be pre-empted, and they can also be prioritised and have their CPU affinity controlled;
- pre-emption is enabled throughout the kernel (CONFIG_PREEMPT instead of CONFIG_PREEMPT_VOLUNTARY);
- the latency debugging tools are enabled, so that the user can determine what kernel operations are blocking progress;
- the timer frequency is set to 1000 Hz instead of 250 Hz.