Queue Based Q-Learning for Efficient Resource Provisioning in Cloud Data Centers

Cloud Computing is a novel paradigm that offers virtual resources on demand through internet. Due to rapid demand to cloud resources, it is difficult to estimate the user's demand. As a result, the complexity of resource provisioning increases, which leads to the requirement of an adaptive resource provisioning. In this paper, the authors address the problem of efficient resource provisioning through Queue based Q-learning algorithm using reinforcement learning agent. Reinforcement learning has been proved in various domains for automatic control and resource provisioning. In the absence of complete environment model, reinforcement learning can be used to define optimal allocation policies. The proposed Queue based Q-learning agent analyses the CPU utilization of all active Virtual Machines (VMs) and detects the least loaded virtual machine for resource provisioning. It detects the least loaded virtual machines through Inter Quartile Range. Using the queue size of virtual machines it looks ahead by one time step to find the optimal virtual machine for provisioning.