Gilad reported at http://lkml.kernel.org/r/1336056962-10465-2-git-send-email-gilad@benyossef.com "Current timer code fails to correctly return a value meaning that there is no future timer event, with the result that the timer keeps getting re-armed in HZ one shot mode even when we could turn it off, generating unneeded interrupts. What is happening is that when __next_timer_interrupt() wishes to return a value that signifies "there is no future timer event", it returns (base->timer_jiffies + NEXT_TIMER_MAX_DELTA). However, the code in tick_nohz_stop_sched_tick(), which called __next_timer_interrupt() via get_next_timer_interrupt(), compares the return value to (last_jiffies + NEXT_TIMER_MAX_DELTA) to see if the timer needs to be re-armed. base->timer_jiffies != last_jiffies and so tick_nohz_stop_sched_tick() interperts the return value as indication that there is a distant future event 12 days from now and programs the timer to fire next after KTIME_MAX nsecs instead of avoiding to arm it. This ends up causing a needless interrupt once every KTIME_MAX nsecs." Fix this by using the new active timer accounting. This avoids scans when no active timer is enqueued completely, so we don't have to rely on base->timer_next and base->timer_jiffies anymore. Reported-by: Gilad Ben-Yossef Signed-off-by: Thomas Gleixner --- kernel/timer.c | 13 ++++++++----- 1 file changed, 8 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-) Index: tip/kernel/timer.c =================================================================== --- tip.orig/kernel/timer.c +++ tip/kernel/timer.c @@ -1326,18 +1326,21 @@ static unsigned long cmp_next_hrtimer_ev unsigned long get_next_timer_interrupt(unsigned long now) { struct tvec_base *base = __this_cpu_read(tvec_bases); - unsigned long expires; + unsigned long expires = now + NEXT_TIMER_MAX_DELTA; /* * Pretend that there is no timer pending if the cpu is offline. * Possible pending timers will be migrated later to an active cpu. */ if (cpu_is_offline(smp_processor_id())) - return now + NEXT_TIMER_MAX_DELTA; + return expires; + spin_lock(&base->lock); - if (time_before_eq(base->next_timer, base->timer_jiffies)) - base->next_timer = __next_timer_interrupt(base); - expires = base->next_timer; + if (base->active_timers) { + if (time_before_eq(base->next_timer, base->timer_jiffies)) + base->next_timer = __next_timer_interrupt(base); + expires = base->next_timer; + } spin_unlock(&base->lock); if (time_before_eq(expires, now)) -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/