Enhancement in linux ondemand governor for periodic loads

A method of operating a CPU frequency governor to optimize performance and power savings for periodic CPU loads, the method comprising:

• (1) calculating a load on a CPU by integrating instantaneous loads on the CPU over a load sampling period;
• and
• (2) if the load is greater than an upper threshold, then:
• if there have been N prior consecutive determinations that the load was greater than the upper threshold, flush a history data store and instruct the CPU to set its frequency to a turbo frequency, and if not, then:
• add the turbo frequency to the history data store;
• compute a steady-state frequency from the history data store;
• and
• if the steady-state frequency has been computed from M or more data points in the history data store, set the CPU frequency to the steady-state frequency, and if not, set the CPU frequency to the turbo frequency.

A non-transitory, tangible computer readable storage medium, encoded with processor readable instructions to perform a method for controlling a CPU frequency governor, the method comprising:

• monitoring a CPU load;
• determining that the CPU load exceeds an upper threshold;
• determining that N prior consecutive increases to the CPU frequency have been attempted;
• and
• instructing the CPU to set its frequency to a turbo frequency.