Generating Complex, Realistic Cloud Workloads using Recurrent Neural Networks

Decision-making in large-scale compute clouds relies on accurate workload modeling. Unfortunately, prior models have proven insufficient in capturing the complex correlations in real cloud workloads. We introduce the first model of large-scale cloud workloads that captures long-range interjob correlations in arrival rates, resource requirements, and lifetimes. Our approach models workload as a three-stage generative process, with separate models for: (1) the number of batch arrivals over time, (2) the sequence of requested resources, and (3) the sequence of lifetimes. Our lifetime model is a novel extension of recent work in neural survival prediction. It represents and exploits inter-job correlations using a recurrent neural network. We validate our approach by showing it is able to accurately generate the production virtual machine workload of two real-world cloud providers.