linux-kernel - Re: High contention on the sk_buff

lists.openwall.net		lists / announce owl-users owl-dev john-users john-dev passwdqc-users yescrypt popa3d-users / oss-security kernel-hardening musl sabotage tlsify passwords / crypt-dev xvendor / Bugtraq Full-Disclosure linux-kernel linux-netdev linux-ext4 linux-hardening linux-cve-announce PHC
Open Source and information security mailing list archives

Hash Suite for Android: free password hash cracker in your pocket

[<prev] [next>] [<thread-prev] [thread-next>] [day] [month] [year] [list]

Message-Id: <1237425191.8204.41.camel@quadrophenia.thebigcorporation.com>
Date:	Wed, 18 Mar 2009 18:13:11 -0700
From:	Sven-Thorsten Dietrich <sven@...bigcorporation.com>
To:	David Miller <davem@...emloft.net>
Cc:	ghaskins@...ell.com, vernux@...ibm.com, andi@...stfloor.org,
	netdev@...r.kernel.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-rt-users@...r.kernel.org, pmullaney@...ell.com
Subject: Re: High contention on the sk_buff_head.lock

On Wed, 2009-03-18 at 18:03 -0700, David Miller wrote:
> From: Gregory Haskins <ghaskins@...ell.com>
> Date: Wed, 18 Mar 2009 17:54:04 -0400
> 
> > Note that -rt doesnt typically context-switch under contention anymore
> > since we introduced adaptive-locks.  Also note that the contention
> > against the lock is still contention, regardless of whether you have -rt
> > or not.  Its just that the slow-path to handle the contended case for
> > -rt is more expensive than mainline.  However, once you have the
> > contention as stated, you have already lost.
> 
> First, contention is not implicitly a bad thing.
> 

Its a bad thing when it does not scale.

> Second, if the -rt kernel is doing adaptive spinning I see no
> reason why that adaptive spinning is not kicking in here to
> make this problem just go away.
> 

If only the first of N contending threads gets to spin, 2..N would
context-switch.


> This lock is held for mere cycles, just to unlink an SKB from
> the networking qdisc, and then it is immediately released.

For very short hold times, and heavy contention, as well as for
scalability, the solution may lie in tunable spinner-count and adaptive
spinner time-out.

Sven

> --
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-rt-users" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@...r.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html

--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@...r.kernel.org
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/