Re: [PATCH 11/15] sched: Pass unlimited __cpu_power information toupper domain level groups

From: Balbir Singh
Date: Mon Aug 24 2009 - 13:11:04 EST


* Peter Zijlstra <peterz@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> [2009-08-24 17:21:37]:

> On Thu, 2009-08-20 at 15:41 +0200, Andreas Herrmann wrote:
> > For performance reasons __cpu_power in a sched_group might be limited
> > such that the group can handle only one task. To correctly calculate
> > the capacity in upper domain level groups the unlimited power
> > information is required. This patch stores unlimited __cpu_power
> > information in sched_groups.orig_power and uses this when calculating
> > __cpu_power in upper domain level groups.
>
> OK, so this tries to fix the cpu_power wreckage?
>
> ok, so let me try this with an example:
>
>
> Suppose we have a dual-core with shared cache and SMT
>
> 0-3 MC
> 0-1 2-3 SMT
>
> Then both levels fancy setting SHARED_RESOURCES and both levels end up
> normalizing the cpu_power to 1, so when we unplug cpu 2, load-balancing
> gets all screwy because the whole system doesn't get normalized
> properly.
>
> What you propose here is every time we muck with cpu_power we keep the
> real stuff in orig_power and use that to compute the level above.
>
> Except you don't use it in the load-balancer proper, so normalization is
> still hosed.
>
> Its a creative solution, but I'd rather see cpu_power returned to a
> straight sum of actual power to normalize the inter-cpu runqueue weights
> and do the placement decision using something else.

The real solution is to find a way to solve asymmetric load balancing,
I suppose. The asymmetry might be due to cores being hot-plugged for
example

--
Balbir
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