Distributed Resource Allocation and Coordinated Scheduling for End-Edge-Cloud Collaborative Computing

Multi-tier computation offloading is crucial to address capacity constraints and improve flexibility for mobile devices. However, existing research on multi-layer computing offloading faces challenges like inefficient resource utilization and poor scalability, particularly in handling diverse computational tasks. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a distributed resource allocation and mixed task offloading framework for end-edge-cloud collaborative systems that support partial and full task offloading modes. First, we propose a three-tier network computing architecture and formulate a task-offloading utility maximization problem by jointly optimizing mixed task-offloading and resource allocation. The proposed problem is a mixed integer nonlinear program (MINLP), which we solve by decomposing it into two subproblems <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">resource allocation</i> and <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">task offloading</i>. Edge computing resources and bandwidth allocation can be independently optimized at each edge node with a fixed task offloading strategy. Cloud computing resource allocation, while convex, involves a global constraint, which we solve in a decentralized manner using a multi-agent optimization approach. Then, we propose a joint task offloading and resource allocation optimization algorithm, CNO-TORA, to obtain the solution to the formulated problem. The algorithm is supported by strong theoretical guarantees and is almost surely convergent to a globally optimal solution. Experimental results on a real dataset demonstrate that our algorithm is scalable to large-scale networks and outperforms baselines, achieving improvements in average system utility ranging from 4.01%-28.15%.