Re: [RFC patch 3/5] ftrace trace event add missing semicolumn

[Mathieu Desnoyers]

* Frederic Weisbecker (fweisbec@xxxxxxxxx) wrote:
> On Tue, Jan 04, 2011 at 09:35:41PM -0500, Mathieu Desnoyers wrote:
> > * Frederic Weisbecker (fweisbec@xxxxxxxxx) wrote:
> > > On Tue, Jan 04, 2011 at 07:18:37PM -0500, Mathieu Desnoyers wrote:
> > > > * Frederic Weisbecker (fweisbec@xxxxxxxxx) wrote:
> > > > > On Tue, Jan 04, 2011 at 06:16:32PM -0500, Mathieu Desnoyers wrote:
> > > > > > Add a missing semicolumn at the end of a ftrace definition.
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > We currently are not seeing any impact of this missing semicolumn because extra
> > > > > > semicolumns appear all over the place in the code generated from TRACE_EVENT
> > > > > > within ftrace stages.
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > Signed-off-by: Mathieu Desnoyers <mathieu.desnoyers@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > > > > > CC: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@xxxxxxxxxxx>
> > > > > > CC: Frederic Weisbecker <fweisbec@xxxxxxxxx>
> > > > > > CC: Ingo Molnar <mingo@xxxxxxx>
> > > > > > CC: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > > > > > ---
> > > > > >  include/trace/ftrace.h |    2 +-
> > > > > >  1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
> > > > > > 
> > > > > > Index: linux-2.6-lttng/include/trace/ftrace.h
> > > > > > ===================================================================
> > > > > > --- linux-2.6-lttng.orig/include/trace/ftrace.h
> > > > > > +++ linux-2.6-lttng/include/trace/ftrace.h
> > > > > > @@ -69,7 +69,7 @@
> > > > > >  #undef DEFINE_EVENT
> > > > > >  #define DEFINE_EVENT(template, name, proto, args)	\
> > > > > >  	static struct ftrace_event_call	__used		\
> > > > > > -	__attribute__((__aligned__(4))) event_##name
> > > > > > +	__attribute__((__aligned__(4))) event_##name;
> > > > > 
> > > > > But DEFINE_EVENT() calls are supposed to be ";" terminated, no?
> > > > 
> > > > Currently yes, but if you look at the preprocessor output currently generated by
> > > > the current TRACE_EVENT()/DEFINE_EVENT() scheme, there are useless ";" added all
> > > > over the place. I have a patch later in my queue that proposes removal of these
> > > > extra ";" as a cleanup of the TRACE_EVENT() semantic, but I'm keeping it for
> > > > later because it removes the extra ";" at the end of each TRACE_EVENT()
> > > > instance (and thus is more intrusive code-wise).
> > > > 
> > > > Adding this semicolumn here ensures that all Ftrace macros are consistent wrt
> > > > semicolumns. We can get away without consistency currently exactly because the
> > > > current scheme adds many useless semicolumns between each TRACE_EVENT().
> > > 
> > > Are you sure you want to put so much time on this?
> > 
> > We are about to spend more time arguing about it that the time it takes cleaning
> > it up. But here we go.
> 
> Hardly, as the real cleanup requires dozens of patches to clean every trace
> events.

I know, but it's hardly a large change in terms of lines of code, not
complexity.

> 
> But dropping the requirement of a ";" after the macro calls still sounds
> sensible.

Glad to hear that :) More information below,

>  
> > > 
> > > This will require a massive change for the sole win of removing double ";"
> > > in generated code. This won't optimize much the build, and it will make the things
> > > not so much more readable for very rare people who dare to have interest into the
> > > TRACE_EVENT generated code. That notwithstanding the obfuscation of that generated
> > > code resides more in the lack of indentation and newlines than in double
> > > semicolons that we barely notice.
> > 
> > Building:
> > 
> > make kernel/sched.o V=1
> > 
> > taking the gcc invokation, changing it to:
> > 
> > gcc -Wp,-MD,kernel/.sched.o.d  -nostdinc -isystem /usr/local/lib/gcc/x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu/4.5.1/include -I/home/compudj/git/linux-tip/arch/x86/include -Iinclude  -include include/generated/autoconf.h -D__KERNEL__ -Wall -Wundef -Wstrict-prototypes -Wno-trigraphs -fno-strict-aliasing -fno-common -Werror-implicit-function-declaration -Wno-format-security -fno-delete-null-pointer-checks -O2 -m64 -march=core2 -mno-red-zone -mcmodel=kernel -funit-at-a-time -maccumulate-outgoing-args -DCONFIG_AS_CFI=1 -DCONFIG_AS_CFI_SIGNAL_FRAME=1 -DCONFIG_AS_CFI_SECTIONS=1 -pipe -Wno-sign-compare -fno-asynchronous-unwind-tables -mno-sse -mno-mmx -mno-sse2 -mno-3dnow -Wframe-larger-than=1024 -fno-stack-protector -fno-omit-frame-pointer -fno-optimize-sibling-calls -Wdeclaration-after-statement -Wno-pointer-sign -fno-strict-overflow -fconserve-stack    -D"KBUILD_STR(s)=#s" -D"KBUILD_BASENAME=KBUILD_STR(sched)"  -D"KBUILD_MODNAME=KBUILD_STR(sched)"  -E -o kernel/sched.pp kernel/sched.c
> > 
> > An exerpt of the output, fed through "indent" for readability:
> > 
> > static inline __attribute__ ((always_inline))
> >      void
> > # 275 "include/trace/events/sched.h"
> >        check_trace_callback_type_sched_process_fork
> > # 252 "include/trace/events/sched.h"
> >       
> >        (void (*cb)
> >         (void *__data, struct task_struct * parent,
> >          struct task_struct * child))
> > {
> > }
> > # 275 "include/trace/events/sched.h"
> >  ;
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > # 305 "include/trace/events/sched.h"
> >  ;
> > 
> > 
> > As we can notice, a few extra ";" are added between each "entity" created by the
> > ftrace trace event phase. This works only as long as we declare
> > semicolumn-separated C structure elements, functions, and statements, because
> > the compiler just skips the extra semicolumns, but forbids creation of arrays of
> > events, which need to be comma-separated.
> 
> So what are these arrays of events you have in mind?

Currently, Ftrace is creating a "ftrace_define_fields_##call" function for each
event to define the event fields, which consumes space. It also has the
".fields" list head to keep a dynamically generated list of event fields.

By allowing creation of arrays of events, we can do the following: turn the
dynamically created list of event fields into a first-level const array listing
event fields. We can use ARRAY_SIZE() on this array to know its size,
statically. Then, in a following trace event stage, we can create another const
array containing tuples of (pointers to the event-specific arrays, array size).

So we get all the same information Ftrace currently gets with much less code
overall, much less read-write data, and less dynamic initialization code.

The following relevant code snippets does the trick. It's extracted from my
LTTng git tree. Feel free to use any variation of it if you want.

Thanks,

Mathieu

/*
 * Stage 1 of the trace events.
 *
 * Create event field type metadata section.
 * Each event produce an array of fields.
 */

#include "lttng-events-reset.h" /* Reset all macros within TRACE_EVENT */

/* Named field types must be defined in lttng-types.h */

#undef __field
#define __field(_type, _item)                                   \
        { .name = #_item, .type = { .atype = atype_integer, .name = #_type} },

[... same for __array, __dynamic_array, __string, ...]

#undef TP_STRUCT__entry
#define TP_STRUCT__entry(args...) args  /* Only one used in this phase */

#undef DECLARE_EVENT_CLASS
#define DECLARE_EVENT_CLASS(_name, _proto, _args, _tstruct, _assign, _print) \
        static const struct lttng_event_field __event_fields___##_name[] = { \
                _tstruct                                                     \
        };

#include TRACE_INCLUDE(TRACE_INCLUDE_FILE)


/*
 * Stage 2 of the trace events.
 *
 * Create an array of events.
 */

/* Named field types must be defined in lttng-types.h */

#include "lttng-events-reset.h" /* Reset all macros within TRACE_EVENT */

#undef DEFINE_EVENT
#define DEFINE_EVENT(_template, _name, _proto, _args)                          \
                {                                                              \
                        .fields = __event_fields___##_template,                \
                        .name = #_name,                                        \
                        .nr_fields = ARRAY_SIZE(__event_fields___##_template), \
                },

#define TP_ID1(_token, _system) _token##_system
#define TP_ID(_token, _system)  TP_ID1(_token, _system)

static const struct lttng_event_desc TP_ID(__event_desc___, TRACE_SYSTEM)[] = {
#include TRACE_INCLUDE(TRACE_INCLUDE_FILE)
};

#undef TP_ID1
#undef TP_ID

> 
> > These extra semicolumns we see here are simply polluting the compiler input, and
> > I don't see any reason why we should leave them there.
> 
> Sure they are useless, I just wonder if that alone justifies such a massive change, although
> actually I don't care much :)

-- 
Mathieu Desnoyers
Operating System Efficiency R&D Consultant
EfficiOS Inc.
http://www.efficios.com
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