Prefetch kernel stacks to speed up context switch

[Chen, Kenneth W]

Repost previously discussed patch (on Jul 27, 2005). Ingo did
the same thing for all arch with 471 lines of patch.  I'm still
advocating this little 30 lines patch, of 6 lines introduces
prefetch_stack() generic interface.

Andrew, please consider -mm inclusion. Or advise me what I need
to do to take this forward.  Thanks.

- Ken


------

For architecture like ia64, the switch stack structure is fairly large
(currently 528 bytes).  For context switch intensive application, we
found that significant amount of cache misses occurs in switch_to()
function.  The following patch adds a hook in the schedule() function to
prefetch switch stack structure as soon as 'next' task is determined. 
This allows maximum overlap in prefetch cache lines for that structure.

Signed-off-by: Ken Chen <kenneth.w.chen@xxxxxxxxx>

 arch/ia64/kernel/entry.S  |   23 +++++++++++++++++++++++
 include/asm-ia64/system.h |    1 +
 include/linux/sched.h     |    5 +++++
 kernel/sched.c            |    1 +
 4 files changed, 30 insertions(+)


--- ./arch/ia64/kernel/entry.S.orig	2005-08-09 15:32:47.778894000 -0700
+++ ./arch/ia64/kernel/entry.S	2005-08-09 16:14:17.839410590 -0700
@@ -470,6 +470,29 @@ ENTRY(load_switch_stack)
 	br.cond.sptk.many b7
 END(load_switch_stack)
 
+GLOBAL_ENTRY(prefetch_stack)
+	add r14 = -IA64_SWITCH_STACK_SIZE, sp
+	add r15 = IA64_TASK_THREAD_KSP_OFFSET, in0
+	;;
+	ld8 r16 = [r15]				// load next's stack pointer
+	lfetch.fault.excl [r14], 128
+	;;
+	lfetch.fault.excl [r14], 128
+	lfetch.fault [r16], 128
+	;;
+	lfetch.fault.excl [r14], 128
+	lfetch.fault [r16], 128
+	;;
+	lfetch.fault.excl [r14], 128
+	lfetch.fault [r16], 128
+	;;
+	lfetch.fault.excl [r14], 128
+	lfetch.fault [r16], 128
+	;;
+	lfetch.fault [r16], 128
+	br.ret.sptk.many rp
+END(prefetch_switch_stack)
+
 GLOBAL_ENTRY(execve)
 	mov r15=__NR_execve			// put syscall number in place
 	break __BREAK_SYSCALL
--- ./include/asm-ia64/system.h.orig	2005-08-09 15:32:51.100183000 -0700
+++ ./include/asm-ia64/system.h	2005-08-09 16:10:08.942929264 -0700
@@ -274,6 +274,7 @@ extern void ia64_load_extra (struct task
  */
 #define __ARCH_WANT_UNLOCKED_CTXSW
 
+#define ARCH_HAS_PREFETCH_SWITCH_STACK
 #define ia64_platform_is(x) (strcmp(x, platform_name) == 0)
 
 void cpu_idle_wait(void);
--- ./include/linux/sched.h.orig	2005-08-09 15:32:51.339441000 -0700
+++ ./include/linux/sched.h	2005-08-09 16:02:35.378481695 -0700
@@ -592,6 +592,11 @@ extern int groups_search(struct group_in
 #define GROUP_AT(gi, i) \
     ((gi)->blocks[(i)/NGROUPS_PER_BLOCK][(i)%NGROUPS_PER_BLOCK])
 
+#ifdef ARCH_HAS_PREFETCH_SWITCH_STACK
+extern void prefetch_stack(struct task_struct*);
+#else
+static inline void prefetch_stack(struct task_struct *t) { }
+#endif
 
 struct audit_context;		/* See audit.c */
 struct mempolicy;
--- ./kernel/sched.c.orig	2005-08-09 15:32:51.429284000 -0700
+++ ./kernel/sched.c	2005-08-09 16:02:51.929262743 -0700
@@ -2887,6 +2887,7 @@ switch_tasks:
 	if (next == rq->idle)
 		schedstat_inc(rq, sched_goidle);
 	prefetch(next);
+	prefetch_stack(next);
 	clear_tsk_need_resched(prev);
 	rcu_qsctr_inc(task_cpu(prev));
 



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