linux-kernel - Re: [Patch] Scale pidhash_shift/pidhash_size up based on num_possible

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Message-ID: <m1iqul25rk.fsf@frodo.ebiederm.org>
Date:	Thu, 31 Jul 2008 12:49:35 -0700
From:	ebiederm@...ssion.com (Eric W. Biederman)
To:	Robin Holt <holt@....com>
Cc:	"Eric W. Biederman" <ebiederm@...ssion.com>,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, Pavel Emelyanov <xemul@...nvz.org>,
	Oleg Nesterov <oleg@...sign.ru>,
	Sukadev Bhattiprolu <sukadev@...ibm.com>,
	Paul Menage <menage@...gle.com>,
	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>
Subject: Re: [Patch] Scale pidhash_shift/pidhash_size up based on num_possible_cpus().

Robin Holt <holt@....com> writes:

> On Thu, Jul 31, 2008 at 11:35:19AM -0700, Eric W. Biederman wrote:
>> Robin Holt <holt@....com> writes:
>> 
>> > For large cpu configurations, we find the number of pids in a pidhash
>> > bucket cause things like 'ps' to perform slowly.  Raising pidhash_shift
>> > from 12 to 16 cut the time for 'ps' in half on a 2048 cpu machine.
>> >
>> > This patch makes the upper limit scale based upon num_possible_cpus().
>> > For machines 128 cpus or less, the current upper limit of 12 is
>> > maintained.
>> 
>> It looks like there is a magic limit we are dancing around.
>> 
>> Can we please make the maximum for the hash table size be based
>> on the maximum number of pids.  That is fls(PID_MAX_LIMIT) - 6?
>
> I am happy to base it upon whatever you think is correct.  So long as it
> goes up for machines with lots of cpus, that will satisfy me.  It is
> probably as much a problem on smaller machines, but if you have _THAT_
> many pids in use, you are probably oversubscribing many other resources
> and don't really care.  That limit will essentially become a constant
> (compiler may even do that for us but I have not checked any arch other
> that ia64).  Should I just replace the 12 with a 16 or 17 or some new
> magic number?

I like setting the limit as a maximum hash chain length.
Which is what fls(PID_MAX_LIMIT) - X is.  X is the maximum hash chain
length you can tolerate.

Eric

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