linux-kernel - Re: [tip:core/rcu] Revert "rcu: Decrease memory-barrier usage based on semi-formal proof"

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Message-ID: <20110525204849.GK2341@linux.vnet.ibm.com>
Date:	Wed, 25 May 2011 13:48:49 -0700
From:	"Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com>
To:	Ingo Molnar <mingo@...e.hu>
Cc:	Yinghai Lu <yinghai@...nel.org>, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	mingo@...hat.com, hpa@...or.com, tglx@...utronix.de
Subject: Re: [tip:core/rcu] Revert "rcu: Decrease memory-barrier usage
 based on semi-formal proof"

On Wed, May 25, 2011 at 09:24:06AM +0200, Ingo Molnar wrote:
> 
> * Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com> wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, May 24, 2011 at 05:13:06PM -0700, Yinghai Lu wrote:
> > > On 05/24/2011 05:05 PM, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > > > On Tue, May 24, 2011 at 02:23:45PM -0700, Yinghai Lu wrote:
> > > >> On 05/23/2011 06:35 PM, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > > >>> On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 06:26:23PM -0700, Yinghai Lu wrote:
> > > >>>> On 05/23/2011 06:18 PM, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>>> OK, so it looks like I need to get this out of the way in order to track
> > > >>>>> down the delays.  Or does reverting PeterZ's patch get you a stable
> > > >>>>> system, but with the longish delays in memory_dev_init()?  If the latter,
> > > >>>>> it might be more productive to handle the two problems separately.
> > > >>>>>
> > > >>>>> For whatever it is worth, I do see about 5% increase in grace-period
> > > >>>>> duration when switching to kthreads.  This is acceptable -- your
> > > >>>>> 30x increase clearly is completely unacceptable and must be fixed.
> > > >>>>> Other than that, the main thing that affects grace period duration is
> > > >>>>> the setting of CONFIG_HZ -- the smaller the HZ value, the longer the
> > > >>>>> grace-period duration.
> > > >>>>
> > > >>>> for my 1024g system when memory hotadd is enabled in kernel config:
> > > >>>> 1. current linus tree + tip tree:  memory_dev_init will take about 100s.
> > > >>>> 2. current linus tree + tip tree + your tree - Peterz patch: 
> > > >>>>    a. on fedora 14 gcc: will cost about 4s: like old times
> > > >>>>    b. on opensuse 11.3 gcc: will cost about 10s.
> > > >>>
> > > >>> So some patch in my tree that is not yet in tip makes things better?
> > > >>>
> > > >>> If so, could you please see which one?  Maybe that would give me a hint
> > > >>> that could make things better on opensuse 11.3 as well.
> > > >>
> > > >> today's tip:
> > > >>
> > > >> [   31.795597] cpu_dev_init done
> > > >> [   40.930202] memory_dev_init done
> > > > 
> > > > One other question...  What is memory_dev_init() doing to wait for so
> > > > many RCU grace periods?  (Yes, I do need to fix the slowdowns in any
> > > > case, but I am curious.)
> > > 
> > > looks like it register some in sysfs
> > 
> > Use of synchronize_rcu() for unregistering would make sense, but
> > I don't understand why it is needed when registering.
> 
> I guess writing a patch to remove it would be welcome by the sysfs folks - or 
> some subtle reason would be pointed out (which reason could thus be added to 
> the code in a comment).
> 
> Understanding the nondeterminism of grace periods would be extremely nice 
> though, there *are* workloads that use rcu syncs rather frequently, and we have 
> probably regressed them.

Agreed, if I can help people speed up sysfs creation, that would be good,
but avoiding/fixing RCU grace-period performance regressions is also a
good thing.

							Thanx, Paul
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