On the Asymptotic Behavior of Time-Sharing Systems

Abstract

It is shown that time-sharing systems may have asymptotic response times whose dependence on the number of active users is not exclusively a function of ‘think time’ and maximal throughput under heavy load conditions. Two such cases (when there are multiple bottlenecks and when the time-sharing system shares the computer with batch jobs) are examined in detail. These results reduce the estimate of how many terminals may be supported by a given computer system without excessive queueing for resources. © 1982, ACM. All rights reserved.