Cold-Start vs. Warm-Start Miss Ratios

In a two-level computer storage hierarchy, miss
ratio measurements are often made from a "cold 
start," that is made with the first-level  store initially
empty.  For large capacities the effect on 
the measured miss ratio of the misses incurred while
filling the first-level store can be significant, 
even for long reference strings.  Use of "warm-start"
rather than "cold-start" miss ratios cast doubt 
on the widespread belief that the observed "S-shape" of
lifetime (reciprocal of miss ratio) versus capacity 
curve indicates a property of behavior of programs that
maintain a constant number of pages in main storage. 
 On the other hand, if cold-start miss ratios are measured
as a function of capacity and measurement 
length, then they are useful in studying systems in which
operation of a program is periodically interrupted 
by task switches.  It is shown how to obtain, under simple
assumptions, the cache miss ratio for multiprogramming 
from cold-start miss ratio values and how to obtain
approximate cold-start miss ratios from warm-start 
miss ratios.

CACM October, 1978

Easton, M.
Fagin, R.

Miss ratio, cold start, warm start, storage hierarchy,
lifetime function, multiprogramming, S-shape

3.70 4.32 9.35

CA781009 DH January 29, 1979  5:16 PM

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