Re: sched_yield: delete sysctl_sched_compat_yield

From: Ingo Molnar
Date: Mon Dec 03 2007 - 05:17:32 EST



* Zhang, Yanmin <yanmin_zhang@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> > as far as desktop apps such as firefox goes, the exact opposite is
> > true. We had two choices basically: either a "more agressive" yield
> > than before or a "less agressive" yield. Desktop apps were reported
> > to hurt from a "more agressive" yield (firefox for example gets some
> > pretty bad delays),
>
> Why not to change source codes of firefox? [...]

because we care a heck of a lot more about a widely used open-source
package's default "user experience" than we care about closed-source
volanomark scores...

do you realize the absurdity of that suggestion: in essence we'd punish
firefox _because it is open-source and can be changed_. So basically
firefox would get a more preferential treatment if it was closed-source
and could not be changed? That's totally backwards.

> If the sched_compat_yield=0, the sys_sched_yield almost does nothing
> but returns, so firefox could just do not call sched_yield. I assume
> 'sched_compat_yield=0' ~ no_call_to_sched_yield.
>
> It's easier to delete calls to sched_yield in applications than to
> tune calls to sched_yield.

We are not at all worried about punishing silly benchmark behavior - and
volanomark's call to Thread.yield (if that's indeed what is happening -
could you try to trace it to make sure?) is outright silly. There are
other chatroom benchmarks such as hackbench.c and hackbench_pth.c that i
test frequently, and they are not affected by any yield details. (and
even then it's still taken with a grain of salt - remember dbench)

Ingo
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