Optimal Selection of CPU Speed, Device Capacities, and File Assignments

This paper presents a computer system configuration design problem in which the objective is to select the CPU speed, the capacities of secondary storage devices, and the allocation of a set of files across the secondary storage devices so as to maximize the system throughput subject to a cost constraint. It is shown that any relative maximum of this complex nonlinear programming problem is also a global maximum. A technique to significantly reduce the dimensionality of the optimization problem is presented along.with an example to illustrate the model's usefulness. The well-known file assignment problem is shown to be a subproblem of this model, and an example is given which demonstrates this fact. Finally, the errors introduced by the conversion of an essentially discrete problem into a continuous one are estimated and bounded.