linux-kernel - Re: [RFC][PATCH] convert block trace points to TRACE

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Date:	Tue, 19 May 2009 14:04:38 +0800
From:	Li Zefan <lizf@...fujitsu.com>
To:	Ingo Molnar <mingo@...e.hu>
CC:	Jens Axboe <jens.axboe@...cle.com>,
	Steven Rostedt <rostedt@...dmis.org>,
	Frederic Weisbecker <fweisbec@...il.com>,
	Tom Zanussi <tzanussi@...il.com>,
	"Theodore Ts'o" <tytso@....edu>,
	Steven Whitehouse <swhiteho@...hat.com>,
	KOSAKI Motohiro <kosaki.motohiro@...fujitsu.com>,
	LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] convert block trace points to TRACE_EVENT()

Ingo Molnar wrote:
> * Li Zefan <lizf@...fujitsu.com> wrote:
> 
>> TRACE_EVENT is a more generic way to define tracepoints. Doing so adds
>> these new capabilities to this tracepoint:
>>
>>   - zero-copy and per-cpu splice() tracing
>>   - binary tracing without printf overhead
>>   - structured logging records exposed under /debug/tracing/events
>>   - trace events embedded in function tracer output and other plugins
>>   - user-defined, per tracepoint filter expressions
>>   ...
> 
> Nice!
> 
>> Cons and problems:
>>
>>   - no dev_t info for the output of plug, unplug_timer and unplug_io events.
>>     no dev_t info for getrq and sleeprq events if bio == NULL.
>>     no dev_t info for rq_abort,...,rq_requeue events if rq->rq_disk == NULL.
> 
> Cannot we output the numeric major:minor pairs?
> 

No, we can't.

Take plug tracepoint for example, the only argument is a struct request_queue,
but we can't map from a queue to a device, since there is no 1:1 mapping.

That's why blktrace adds dev_t info in struct blk_trace, which is associated
to a queue.

>>   - for large packet commands, only 16 bytes of the command will be output.
>>     Because TRACE_EVENT doesn't support dynamic-sized arrays, though it
>>     supports dynamic-sized strings.
>>
>>   - a packet command is converted to a string in TP_assign, not TP_print.
>>     While blktrace do the convertion just before output.
> 
> Couldnt we do a memcpy instead of the snprintf() in __dump_pdu()? We 
> dont actually interpret the bytes there. We could extend the 
> in-kernel printk format with a 'dump raw memory in hex' type of 
> format specifier.
> 

Sure, it's do-able. The disavantage is then we can't do filtering
on __entry->cmd, because now it's unsigned char[], not a string.

> OTOH, packet requests are rather rare, right? So going to ASCII 
> there results in a simpler interface. In the !blk_pc_request(rq) 
> common case we just return early without any snprintf overhead.
> 

Right. :)

>>   - in blktrace, an event can have 2 different print formats, but 
>>     a TRACE_EVENT has a unique format. (see the output of getrq 
>>     and rq_insert)
> 
> Is this a problem?
> 

One of the defect is, we have __entry->cmd[] even it's not used
if !blk_pc_request(rq).

This can be avoided though, by using __string() (needs small modification)
instead of __array().

> I think a good way forward would be to benchmark the ioctl versus 
> the splice based TRACE_EVENT tracing (via some artificially high 
> rate event, to push things), and see where we are right now in terms 
> of overhead.
> 

I'll try.

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