linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 1/3] mm, sysctl: make VM stats configurable

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Message-ID: <b8d952c5-2803-eea2-cd9a-20463a48075e@linux.intel.com>
Date:   Fri, 15 Sep 2017 07:16:23 -0700
From:   Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@...ux.intel.com>
To:     Michal Hocko <mhocko@...nel.org>, Kemi Wang <kemi.wang@...el.com>
Cc:     "Luis R . Rodriguez" <mcgrof@...nel.org>,
        Kees Cook <keescook@...omium.org>,
        Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
        Jonathan Corbet <corbet@....net>,
        Mel Gorman <mgorman@...hsingularity.net>,
        Johannes Weiner <hannes@...xchg.org>,
        Christopher Lameter <cl@...ux.com>,
        Sebastian Andrzej Siewior <bigeasy@...utronix.de>,
        Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@...e.cz>,
        Hillf Danton <hillf.zj@...baba-inc.com>,
        Tim Chen <tim.c.chen@...el.com>,
        Andi Kleen <andi.kleen@...el.com>,
        Jesper Dangaard Brouer <brouer@...hat.com>,
        Ying Huang <ying.huang@...el.com>,
        Aaron Lu <aaron.lu@...el.com>,
        Proc sysctl <linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org>,
        Linux MM <linux-mm@...ck.org>,
        Linux Kernel <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/3] mm, sysctl: make VM stats configurable

On 09/15/2017 04:49 AM, Michal Hocko wrote:
> Why do we need an auto-mode? Is it safe to enforce by default.

Do we *need* it?  Not really.

But, it does offer the best of both worlds: The vast majority of users
see virtually no impact from the counters.  The minority that do need
them pay the cost *and* don't have to change their tooling at all.

> Is it> possible that userspace can get confused to see 0 NUMA stats in
the
> first read while other allocation stats are non-zero?

I doubt it.  Those counters are pretty worthless by themselves.  I have
tooling that goes and reads them, but it aways displays deltas.  Read
stats, sleep one second, read again, print the difference.

The only scenario I can see mattering is someone who is seeing a
performance issue due to NUMA allocation misses (or whatever) and wants
to go look *back* in the past.

A single-time printk could also go a long way to keeping folks from
getting confused.