Memory Fundamentals for SQL Server - SQL Server Memory Components, SQL Server Memory Logical Tree

In the Previous blogs we have seen about virtual memory related concepts.
http://sqlandmorewithkruti.blogspot.in/2016/01/memory-fundamentals-for-sql-server.html

We came across concepts like Address Window Extension, Physical Address Extension.

http://sqlandmorewithkruti.blogspot.in/2016/02/memory-fundamentals-for-sql-server-awe.html

We also saw the various CPU related architectural concepts and briefly touch based SQLOS.

http://sqlandmorewithkruti.blogspot.in/2016/02/memory-fundamentals-for-sql-server.html

In this blog we shall see how SQL server memory is divided.

When SQL server starts memory is first reserved for the MEM To Leave area also known as Virtual Address Space Reservation area. This is not user configurable. Windows Memory Management allows user process to reserve a contiguous block of address space without actually consuming committed pages. This is called VAS reservation or MEM to Leave. Components of the Mem To Leave area are mentioned above. All allocations for a contiguous memory block larger than 8KB come from the MemToLeave region. it's possible that allocations smaller than 8KB could end up coming from the MemToLeave region.

The default size of Mem To Leave region is 256MB but can be changed using the -g parameter during SQL server startup.

Next comes the BUFFER Pool

Calculation of BufferPool Region

We have the maximum server memory option for any SQL server instance. This option decides the amount of memory that will be allocated for the Buffer Pool region. Bpool consists of 32 separate memory regions organized into 8KB pages.


In 32-Bit Systems

Once the MemToLeave region is occupied the remaining Virtual Address Space is checked. The remainder of the VAS is calculated and reserved for SQL server. If this value is less than Max Server Configuration then that becomes the size of the Buffer Pool.

The calculation of the Buffer Pool size however differs if the AWE is enabled and /PAE switch is used. Here the physcial memory on the server or the max server memory configuration setting, whichever is smaller becomes the size of the Buffer Pool.

In 64-Bit Systems

There is no need to use AWE to allocate memory above 3GB for SQL Server since the user mode VAS is 8TB there is always ample VAS to utilize all of the physical memory available on the server.

For 64 bit servers, the maximum size of the BPool is the size of physical memory or the max server memory configuration, whichever is smaller. For example, a 64 bit server with 16GB RAM, and a default max server memory configuration, the maximum size of the Bpool would be 16GB.

SQL server memory logical level tree

The SQL Server memory manager has a three-level structure. At the bottom are memory nodes which are the lowest level allocators for SQL Server memory, the second level consists of memory clerks which are used to access the memory nodes and cache stores which are used for caching. The top layer contains memory objects which provide a smaller level of granularity than the memory clerks allow directly. 

Memory Nodes
As described in the previous blog it’s a logical unit in which SQL server access memory.

Memory Clerks

Memory clerks access memory nodes to allocate memory to different objects. Information on different types of memory clerks is listed using the below query. Till SQL server version 2008 you will be able to see the segregation of the single pages allocated and multiple pages allocated for particular objects.

select distinct type from sys.dm_os_memory_clerks where type like 'mem%' order by type.

Memory Caches

SQL Server uses three types of caching mechanism: object store, cache store, and user store.

Object Store :

Object stores are used to cache homogeneous types of stateless data. Each entry within this store can be used by only one client at a time. SQLOS does not control the lifetime of the entries in the object store type of cache. Hence it does not implement Least Recently Used (LRU) Algorithm for costing the entries and maintaining their lifetime. One example for use of an object store is the SNI, which uses the object store for pooling network buffers. No state, no cost , all buffers of the same size.

User Store:

User stores are used for objects that has its own storage user's mechanism. How the objects are stored depends on the underlying development framework. SQLOS controls the lifetime of entries and maintains a cost based on LRU algorithm. One example of User Store objects is metadata cache.

Cache Store:

For cache store the lifetime is fully controlled by SQLOS's caching framework. The storage mechanism is SQL OS managed. SQLOS does this with what is called the hashing technique wherein the entry for each object is stored in one or multiple tables. This supports for faster look-ups. SQLOS controls the lifetime of entries and maintains a cost based on LRU algorithm. Object Plans (CACHESTORE_OBJCP), SQL Plans (CACHESTORE_SQLCP), Bound Trees (CACHESTORE_PHDR), Extended Stored Procedures (CACHESTORE_XPROC) all fall within this cache store.

I recommend you go through the below blogs to study further.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/slavao/archive/2005/03/18/398651.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/slavao/archive/2005/08/30/458036.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/slavao/archive/2005/02/19/376714.aspx
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc293624.aspx

Thus SQL server memory gets divided into various stores. On the whole MemToLeave and BufferPool is what comprises the SQL server memory. In the next blog we shall see how SQL server responds to memory pressure. How the memory caches are accounted for based on LRU & hashing algorithms.

Memory Fundamentals for SQL Server - Process-Thread Model, CPU execution model, CPU scheduling, CPU Architechture, SQLOS

Until now we have seen the windows memory addressing concepts.

http://sqlandmorewithkruti.blogspot.in/2016/01/memory-fundamentals-for-sql-server.html

http://sqlandmorewithkruti.blogspot.in/2016/02/memory-fundamentals-for-sql-server-awe.html

So how exactly are user applications like SQL server assigned to this space. To understand this we need to see how the application is broken in terms of processes and threads.

Process

A process is an instance of a running program on Windows. A process can have one or more threads .Each process consists of 2 components process kernel object and virtual address space.The virtual address space contains all the code and data. However the executable code and data isn't loaded until required by the operating system in page-sized chunks (4K for Win32 on x86). Every executable or DLL file mapped into a process's address space is assigned a unique instance handle. SQL Server is a process that can run as either a service or a console mode application

Threads

Threads are unit of execution of a process. Without threads application processes are incapable of carrying out any task on the system. By virtue of Windows' process separation, a thread can't access the address space of other processes without a shared memory section. Once a process is created, the system automatically creates its first thread called primary or main thread. When this thread is killed or exits the process ends.

Quantum

Amount of time a thread is allowed to execute on the processor. When the Quantum is reached or until a higher priority thread interrupts the thread is interrupted and another thread is allowed to run on the processor. This movement of thread out of processor is called Yielding.


Context Switching

When a new thread is selected to run on a processor if the existing thread is interrupted or if the quantum is met some piece of information is saved and loaded next time the thread is back on the CPU for execution. This information consists of data in the volatile registers and other program counters. This process of saving clearing and loading data between thread switching is called context switching.

Thread States

A thread can exists in any of the below states
0 Initialized
1 Ready— waiting on a processor
2 Running— currently using a processor
3 Standby— about to use a processor
4 Terminated— has been stopped
5 Wait— waiting on a peripheral operation or a resource
6 Transition— waiting for resource in order to execute
7 Unknown

Windows allows threads to be suspended and resumed based on Windows API's. If a thread suspends itself for a specified period of time its called a sleeping thread. Else a suspended thread cannot explicitly resume itself until intervened by another thread.

Thread priorities

Windows allocates priorities to thread which govern their behaviour for yielding and context switching.Threads begin life inheriting the base priority of their process. This priority can be set when the process is first created.

Fibers

Fibers are a user-space construct. Its execution is not managed by kernel like threads but they follow. Cooperative scheduling Windows fibers have less overhead associated with them than threads do. One may also call them lightweight threads.Certain components of SQL Server don’t work, or don’t work well, when SQL Server runs in fiber mode. These components include SQLMail and SQLXML. Other components, such as heterogeneous and CLR queries, are not supported at all in fiber mode because they need certain thread-specific facilities provided by Windows.

CPU Execution Models

Single Thread Execution Model

Here one thread is executed as the name suggest per CPU processor.

Multi/Hyper-Threaded Execution Model

Here multiple threads are executed as the name suggest per CPU processor.

CPU Scheduling

CPU scheduling decisions take place under one of four conditions:

1. When a process switches from the running state to the waiting state, such as for an I/O request or invocation of the wait( ) system call. 
2. When a process switches from the running state to the ready state, for example in response to an interrupt. 
3. When a process switches from the waiting state to the ready state, say at completion of I/O or a return from wait( ). 
4. When a process terminates. 

For conditions 1 and 4 there is no choice - A new process must be selected.
For conditions 2 and 3 there is a choice - To either continue running the current process, or select a different one.
If scheduling takes place only under conditions 1 and 4, the system is said to be non-preemptive, or cooperative. Under these conditions, once a process starts running it keeps running, until it either voluntarily blocks or until it finishes. With non-preemptive scheduling, the code that’s being run is written to yield control at key points. At these yield points, the scheduler can determine whether a different task should be run.Otherwise the system is said to be preemptive. Operating system can interrupt the thread execution any time in preemptive scheduling.

CPU Architecture

This refers to how memory is connected with the CPU's It can be either of the following

Symmetric Multiprocessing 

In a symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) architecture, all processors are connected to all of the memory through a shared system bus. Performance is limited by the bus bandwidth.

NonUniform Memory Access

A non-uniform memory access (NUMA) architecture refers to a system where there the total available memory is broken down into multiple nodes. A group of processors are also connected directly to each of these nodes. If a processor is accessing memory on the same node at which it is located its accessing "local" memory pool. If the processor is accessing memory from a different node its accessing remote or non-local memory. Thus it reduces in cost of using shared memory bus but there comes additional higher cost of accessing remote memory.

In a SQL Server environment, one of the optimizations that SQL Server can choose is to use parallelization in a query plan. If the available processors are hyper-threaded, then they are not really separate processors; and because each thread in a parallel plan needs to update its status to a single set of data structures, on a system with Hyper-Threading enabled, a parallel plan can see a severe performance degradation.

SQLOS

SQLOS is a thin layer that sits between SQL Server and Windows. It is responsible for scheduling, I/O completion, memory management and resource management. A question may arise when windows already has its own memory management unit why is there a need for another user-mode layer. Reasons being

• Optimizing the way threads are chosen in terms of priority to be executed by schedulers
• Greater flexibility and control on underlying architecture.
• To avoid Context Switching
• Provision of extended diagnostic capabilities such as DAC and DMVs for better troubleshooting.
• Optimization of Windows performance when running SQL server.

Tasks

Any work assigned for SQL server to be carried out or executed is called a task. They are different from SQL server SPID's. A SPID is merely a connection or channel over which requests can be sent. Not necessary an SPID might have any active task assigned. A batch can map to one or more tasks. Tasks are further broken down to Workers. Similar to a process being broken down to threads.

Worker

UMS worker encapsulates a thread or fiber & carries out the tasks within the SQL server. On receiving any new tasks a worker gets assigned to the tasks and is not released till the completion or termination of the task. If any of the worker is free from the pool it gets assigned to the new tasks. Else if the max worker threads value has not been reached, SQL Server will create and allocate a new worker. When the server is in thread mode and a worker has been idle for 15 minutes, SQL Server destroys it, provided doing so will not reduce the number of workers below a predefined threshold.



The Scheduler

When SQL server starts one scheduler is created for each processor on the system. So why do we have the option for processor affinity mask. Each scheduler is set to either ONLINE or OFFLINE based on this option. By default this is automatically configured and all the schedulers are supposed to be online. These schedulers picks up workers from the worker pool for execution. The workers are evenly distributed.

CPU Node

This is a logical unit within SQLOS where in which CPU's are grouped. On an SMP system, all CPUs would be grouped under a single CPU node, whereas on a NUMA-based system, there would be as many CPU nodes as the system supported.

Memory Node

This is a logical unit within SQLOS where in which memory access. There is a memory node for each set of CPUs to localize memory. On an SMP architecture, a memory node shares memory across all CPUs, whereas on a NUMA architecture, a memory node per NUMA node exists. Memory nodes share the memory allocated by Max Server Memory.

SQLOS options in SQL server

Connections, SPID's , Workers

When SQL server receives a new connection request an SPID is assigned. Next the scheduler gets assigned to the SPID . The connection is run on the least loaded scheduler on that node. Until SQL server 2008 the connection was scheduler bound. When subsequent requests are sent from the same SPID, if another scheduler has a load factor that is less than a certain percentage it gets assigned to the new worker for the same SPID.

So how exactly SQLOS puts up with the OS preemptive scheduling.

Each thread under SQLOS has an associated event object. If a thread is in wait state Windows will not consider it for scheduling. SQLOS puts workers(threads/fibers) to sleep until it wants it to be scheduled by making a call to WaitForSingleObject on their corresponding event object. It passes INFINITE as the parameter for the timeout value.

When it should be scheduled SQLOS the object associated with the worker will be signaled. This allows the worker thread to come out of its wait state and windows scheduler will now be able to place the thread based on scheduling to on of the processors. SQLOS relies on the fact that the workers, (threads or fibers) to yield voluntarily often enough so one process or thread doesn’t have exclusive control of the system. However it still adheres to a concept of a quantum. Instead of SQL Server tasks being forced to give up the CPU by the operating system, SQL Server tasks can request to be put on a wait queue periodically, and if they have exceeded the internally defined quantum, and they are not in the middle of an operation that cannot be stopped, they will voluntarily relinquish the CPU.

SQLOS as such is a vast topic to be covered under one post but the above gives a fair idea of its functionality and advantages. Below are a few links for the same.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sqlmeditation/archive/2012/12/13/tasks-worker-threads-scheduler-threads-explain-it-all-and-dmvs.aspx
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms189267(v=sql.105).aspx

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms176043(v=sql.105).aspx
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee210547(v=sql.105).aspx
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-in/library/ms178074.aspx
https://mssqlwiki.com/2013/01/10/sql-server-operating-system-sos-series-1/

https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/sqljourney/2012/12/16/an-in-depth-look-at-sql-server-memorypart-1/

In the next blogs we shall see the segregation of memory in terms of SQL server

Memory Fundamentals for SQL Server - AWE ( Address Windowing Extensions), /PAE Switch (Physical Address Extension)

In the previous blog we saw the difference between Virtual Address Space between 32-bit and 64-bit systems. We also saw how virtual memory works and how /3GB switch can be used to increase the user access mode limit.

http://sqlandmorewithkruti.blogspot.in/2016/01/memory-fundamentals-for-sql-server.html

In this module we shall see what is AWE and /PAE switch for 32-bit systems.

Address Windows Extensions

As we have seen previously that the addresses are limited to 4GB virtual address space in 32-bit Operating System. However machines may have more than 4GB of RAM installed.Now Virtual Memory comprises of RAM and Paging file. So how then these user processes have access to an address which falls beyond the 4GB addressing scheme. This is facilitated by Windows through a mechanism called AWE (Address Window Extension).

It enables a process to reserve an address in the VAS which is again mapped to a different physical address range in RAM. This process is called windowing and is illustrated by the below diagram.

A user process must have the "Lock Pages in Memory" permission to leverage the benefits of AWE mechanism. AWE exists on all editions of Windows 2000 and later.In order for SQL Server to use the AWE APIs, you need to enable AWE. Once enabled, the next time SQL Server is started it will attempt to lock memory pages so that it can use AWE.

There are a few considerations to be made when using AWE

•  Primarily it's obvious that AWE is to support memory more than 4GB. If one were enable this option where the RAM that is less than 3GB it will be completely ignored. Application will be allocated memory as per Virtual Memory.
• An advantage of AWE is that it is never swapped to disk so it has reasonably faster access. AWE memory management differs from Virtual Memory Management. Its purely physical memory and its mappings.
• The design ensures that any memory allocated using the APIs cannot be shared with any other process and is made nonpageable, or locked.
• Only data cache pages are stored in AWE mapped memory. Data cache is a component of the SQL Server Buffer Pool area which will be seen in the later sections of this blog. 
• The  virtual memory window used to buffer the physical memory provided by AWE requires readwrite access.

How to Enable AWE

1. First we need to grant SQL server account "LOCK PAGE IN MEMORY" permission by editing the local group policies.

2. Enabling AWE through GUI

3. Enabling AWE through script

sp_configure 'show advanced options', 1
RECONFIGURE
GO
sp_configure 'awe enabled', 1
RECONFIGURE
GO

You may go through the below links for technet articles on the same.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms190673(v=sql.105).aspx

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-GB/library/ms190731(v=sql.105).aspx

AWE option can also be enabled for 64-bit systems but for the purpose of this blog it shall

 be covered later.

Physical Address Extension /PAE

      We've covered how to increase memory for user mode access by using the /3GB switch. We have also seen how to utilize the available physical memory more than 4GB using AWE. There is yet another switch called the Physical Address Extension /PAE switch which allows access for upto 128GB of RAM. Its a hardware related enhancement where the address bus is 36-bit. So now the number of addresses supported is (2^26).In terms of memory management there still exists page directories and page table entries for virtual memory mapping. In addition another level of page directory pointer table is added. The PTE is 4KB instead of 8KB. With this switch the Page Directory Table and Page Table Entries are 64-bit long so more number of addresses can be mapped. Thus unlike AWE there is a change in the memory structures and maps.

How to Enable /PAE Switch
Similar to /3GB switch you add /PAE switch in the BOOT.INI file.

Microsoft recommends the thumb rule as follows
If your system has < 4 GB - use only /3GB
If your system has > 4 GB and < 16 GB - use /3GB + /PAE + AWE
If your system has > 16 GB - use /PAE + AWE

Technet link for considerations of all the 3 options are as below

http://blogs.technet.com/b/marcelofartura/archive/2006/09/14/3gb-pae-awe-what-basic.aspx
http://blogs.technet.com/b/beatrice/archive/2008/08/29/3gb-pae-and-awe-taking-away-some-confusion.aspx
http://blogs.technet.com/b/perfguru/archive/2007/12/05/scenarios-using-3gb-and-pae-switch-and-appropriate-uses-of-these-switches.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/chadboyd/archive/2007/03/24/pae-and-3gb-and-awe-oh-my.aspx

Now that the basics are clear in the coming blogs we shall see how memory and CPU execute a user process like SQL server.