I am a Post-Doc Researcher in the Systems and Networking group at Microsoft Research Cambridge. My main research interests lie in operating systems, runtime systems and programming language support for multi-core architectures. I am particularly interested in improving the interface between application programs and heterogeneous architectures, such as the IBM Cell processor, NUMA architectures and CPU/GPU hybrid systems. I am currently involved in the Barrelfish operating system, which is a joint collaboration between Microsoft Research and ETH-Zurich.
My PhD research, at the University of Glasgow, involved the creation of a Java Virtual Machine for the Cell processor, called Hera-JVM. My Masters Research project involved using the Xen Virtual Machine Monitor to partition a network router's resources between multiple competing QoS network flows. During an internship with Microsoft Research Redmond I worked on an extension to the Singularity operating system, known as Helios, aimed at supporting heterogeneous multicore platforms.
- Ross McIlroy and Joe Sventek, Hera-JVM: A Runtime System for Heterogeneous Multi-Core Architectures, in Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages & Applications (OOPSLA '10), Association for Computing Machinery, Inc., October 2010
- Ross McIlroy, Using Program Behaviour to Exploit Heterogeneous Multi-Core Processors, April 2010
- Edmund B. Nightingale, Orion Hodson, Ross McIlroy, Chris Hawblitzel, and Galen Hunt, Helios: Heterogeneous Multiprocessing with Satellite Kernels, in Proceedings of the 22nd Symposium on Operating Systems Principles (SOSP '09), Association for Computing Machinery, Inc., Big Sky, MT, October 2009
- Ross McIlroy and Joe Sventek, Hera-JVM: Abstracting Processor Heterogeneity Behind a Virtual Machine, in Workshop on Hot Topics in Operating Systems (HotOS), USENIX, 2009
- Ross McIlroy, Peter Dickman, and Joe Sventek, Efficient Dynamic Heap Allocation of Scratch-Pad Memory, in Proceedings of the International Symposium on Memory Management, Association for Computing Machinery, Inc., 2008
- Ross McIlroy and Orion Hodson, Subordinate Kernels: Application Offloading in Asymmetric Multi-Processor Systems, in Workshop on Operating System Support for Heterogeneous Multi-Core Architectures, Association for Computing Machinery, Inc., 2007
- Ross McIlroy and Joe Sventek, Resource Virtualisation of Network Routers, in Workshop on High Performance Switching and Routing (HPSR06), IEEE Communications Society, 2006
- Ross McIlroy, Network Router Resource Virtualisation, 2005
Professional Activities
I am a chair of the Workshop on Systems for Future Multi-Core Architectures (SFMA'2011), which is co-located with EuroSys 2011 in Salzburg, Austria.
I am a member of the program committee for VEE 2011.
I was the website chair for EuroSys 2008, and assisted in local arrangements. I was also a chair of the Workshop on Operating Systems support for Heterogeneous Multicore Architectures held at PACT 2007.
I have reviewed for OSHMA'07, CCNC'09, ACM Wireless Networks, ACM OS Review and VEE'11.
