linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 0/3] zsmalloc: small compaction improvements

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Date:	Tue, 14 Jul 2015 21:29:32 +0900
From:	Sergey Senozhatsky <sergey.senozhatsky@...il.com>
To:	Minchan Kim <minchan@...nel.org>
Cc:	Sergey Senozhatsky <sergey.senozhatsky.work@...il.com>,
	Sergey Senozhatsky <sergey.senozhatsky@...il.com>,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>, linux-mm@...ck.org,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 0/3] zsmalloc: small compaction improvements

On (07/14/15 09:55), Minchan Kim wrote:
> > It depends on 'big overhead' definition, of course. We don't care
> > that much when compaction is issued by the shrinker, because things
> > are getting bad and we can sacrifice performance. But user triggered
> > compaction on a I/O pressured device can needlessly slow things down,
> > especially now, when we drain ALMOST_FULL classes.
> 
> You mean performance overhead by additional alloc_pages?

not only performance, but yes, performance mostly.

> If so, you mean ALMOST_EMPTY|ALMOST_FULL, not only ALMOST_FULL?

of course, I meant your recent patch here. should have been 'we _ALSO_
drain ALMOST_FULL classes'

> 
> So, it's performance enhance patch?
> Please give the some number to justify patchset.

alrighty... again...

> > 
> > /sys/block/zram<id>/compact is a black box. We provide it, we don't
> > throttle it in the kernel, and user space is absolutely clueless when
> > it invokes compaction. From some remote (or alternative) point of
> 
> But we have zs_can_compact so it can effectively skip the class if it
> is not proper class.

user triggered compaction can compact too much.
in its current state triggering a compaction from user space is like
playing a lottery or a russian roulette.

a simple script

for i in {1..1000}; do
        echo -n 'compact... ';
        cat /sys/block/zram0/compact;
        echo 1 > /sys/block/zram0/compact;
        sleep 1;
done

(and this is not so crazy. love it or not, but this is the only way
how user space can use compaction at the moment).

the output
...
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 409
compact... 3550
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 2129
compact... 765
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 784
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
compact... 0
...

(f.e., we compacted 3550 pages on device being under I/O pressure.
that's quite a lot, don't you think so?).

first	-- no enforced compaction
second	-- with enforced compaction

./iozone -t 8 -R -r 4K -s 200M -I +Z

                        w/o               w/compaction
"  Initial write "    549240.49             538710.62
"        Rewrite "   2447973.19            2442312.38
"           Read "   5533620.69            5611562.00
"        Re-read "   5689199.81            4916373.62
"   Reverse Read "   4094576.16            5280551.56
"    Stride read "   5382067.75            5395350.00
"    Random read "   5384945.56            5298079.62
" Mixed workload "   3986770.06            3918897.78
"   Random write "   2290869.12            2201346.50
"         Pwrite "    502619.36             493527.64
"          Pread "   2675312.28            2732118.19
"         Fwrite "   4198686.06            3373855.09
"          Fread "  18054401.25           17895797.00


> > view compaction can be seen as "zsmalloc's cache flush" (unused objects
> > make write path quicker - no zspage allocation needed) and it won't
> > hurt to give user space some numbers so it can decide if the whole
> > thing is worth it (that decision is, once again, I/O pattern and
> > setup specific -- some users may be interested in compaction only
> > if it will reduce zsmalloc's memory consumption by, say, 15%).
> 
> Again, your claim is performace so I need number.
> If it's really horrible, I guess below interface makes user handy
> without peeking nr_can_compact ad doing compact.
> 
>         /* Tell zram to compact if fragment ration is higher 15% */
>         echo 15% > /sys/block/zram0/compact
>         or
>         echo 15% > /sys/block/zram/compact_condition

no, this is the least of the things we need to do -- enforced and
pre-defined policy engine in zram/zsmalloc 'that will work for all'.
user space has almost all the numbers to do it, the only missing bit
of the puzzle is `nr_can_compact' number. it's up to user space then
to decide how it wishes things to be done. for example:
"don't compact if compaction will flush 35% of zsmalloc pages on a
I/O pressured device" or something else.

	-ss
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