[PATCH V5 3/6] perf, x86: large PEBS interrupt threshold

[Kan Liang]

From: Yan, Zheng <zheng.z.yan@xxxxxxxxx>

PEBS always had the capability to log samples to its buffers without
an interrupt. Traditionally perf has not used this but always set the
PEBS threshold to one.

For frequently occurring events (like cycles or branches or load/store)
this in term requires using a relatively high sampling period to avoid
overloading the system, by only processing PMIs. This in term increases
sampling error.

For the common cases we still need to use the PMI because the PEBS
hardware has various limitations. The biggest one is that it can not
supply a callgraph. It also requires setting a fixed period, as the
hardware does not support adaptive period. Another issue is that it
cannot supply a time stamp and some other options. To supply a TID it
requires flushing on context switch. It can however supply the IP, the
load/store address, TSX information, registers, and some other things.

So we can make PEBS work for some specific cases, basically as long as
you can do without a callgraph and can set the period you can use this
new PEBS mode.

The main benefit is the ability to support much lower sampling period
(down to -c 1000) without extensive overhead.

One use cases is for example to increase the resolution of the c2c tool.
Another is double checking when you suspect the standard sampling has
too much sampling error.

Some numbers on the overhead, using cycle soak, comparing the elapsed
time from "kernbench -M -H" between plain (threshold set to one) and
multi (large threshold).
The test command for plain:
  "perf record -e cycles:p -c $period -- kernbench -M -H"
The test command for multi:
  "perf record --no-time -e cycles:p -c $period -- kernbench -M -H"
(The only difference of test command between multi and plain is time
stamp options. Since time stamp is not supported by large PEBS
threshold, it can be used as a flag to indicate if large threshold is
enabled during the test.)

period    plain(Sec)  multi(Sec)  Delta
10003     32.7        16.5        16.2
20003     30.2        16.2        14.0
40003     18.6        14.1        4.5
80003     16.8        14.6        2.2
100003    16.9        14.1        2.8
800003    15.4        15.7        -0.3
1000003   15.3        15.2        0.2
2000003   15.3        15.1        0.1

With periods below 100003, plain (threshold one) cause much more
overhead. With 10003 sampling period, the Elapsed Time for multi is
even 2X faster than plain.

Signed-off-by: Yan, Zheng <zheng.z.yan@xxxxxxxxx>
Signed-off-by: Kan Liang <kan.liang@xxxxxxxxx>
---
 arch/x86/kernel/cpu/perf_event_intel_ds.c | 40 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++----
 1 file changed, 36 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/arch/x86/kernel/cpu/perf_event_intel_ds.c b/arch/x86/kernel/cpu/perf_event_intel_ds.c
index 1c16700..16fdb18 100644
--- a/arch/x86/kernel/cpu/perf_event_intel_ds.c
+++ b/arch/x86/kernel/cpu/perf_event_intel_ds.c
@@ -250,7 +250,7 @@ static int alloc_pebs_buffer(int cpu)
 {
 	struct debug_store *ds = per_cpu(cpu_hw_events, cpu).ds;
 	int node = cpu_to_node(cpu);
-	int max, thresh = 1; /* always use a single PEBS record */
+	int max;
 	void *buffer, *ibuffer;
 
 	if (!x86_pmu.pebs)
@@ -280,9 +280,6 @@ static int alloc_pebs_buffer(int cpu)
 	ds->pebs_absolute_maximum = ds->pebs_buffer_base +
 		max * x86_pmu.pebs_record_size;
 
-	ds->pebs_interrupt_threshold = ds->pebs_buffer_base +
-		thresh * x86_pmu.pebs_record_size;
-
 	return 0;
 }
 
@@ -667,15 +664,35 @@ struct event_constraint *intel_pebs_constraints(struct perf_event *event)
 	return &emptyconstraint;
 }
 
+/*
+ * Flags PEBS can handle without an PMI.
+ *
+ * TID can only be handled by flushing at context switch.
+ */
+#define PEBS_FREERUNNING_FLAGS	\
+	(PERF_SAMPLE_IP | PERF_SAMPLE_TID | PERF_SAMPLE_ADDR | \
+	PERF_SAMPLE_ID | PERF_SAMPLE_CPU | PERF_SAMPLE_STREAM_ID | \
+	PERF_SAMPLE_DATA_SRC | PERF_SAMPLE_IDENTIFIER | \
+	PERF_SAMPLE_TRANSACTION)
+
+static inline bool pebs_is_enabled(struct cpu_hw_events *cpuc)
+{
+	return (cpuc->pebs_enabled & ((1ULL << MAX_PEBS_EVENTS) - 1));
+}
+
 void intel_pmu_pebs_enable(struct perf_event *event)
 {
 	struct cpu_hw_events *cpuc = this_cpu_ptr(&cpu_hw_events);
 	struct hw_perf_event *hwc = &event->hw;
+	struct debug_store *ds = cpuc->ds;
+	bool first_pebs;
+	u64 threshold;
 
 	hwc->config &= ~ARCH_PERFMON_EVENTSEL_INT;
 	if (!event->attr.freq)
 		hwc->flags |= PERF_X86_EVENT_AUTO_RELOAD;
 
+	first_pebs = !pebs_is_enabled(cpuc);
 	cpuc->pebs_enabled |= 1ULL << hwc->idx;
 
 	if (event->hw.flags & PERF_X86_EVENT_PEBS_LDLAT)
@@ -683,6 +700,21 @@ void intel_pmu_pebs_enable(struct perf_event *event)
 	else if (event->hw.flags & PERF_X86_EVENT_PEBS_ST)
 		cpuc->pebs_enabled |= 1ULL << 63;
 
+	/*
+	 * When the event is constrained enough we can use a larger
+	 * threshold and run the event with less frequent PMI.
+	 */
+	if (0 && /* disable this temporarily */
+	    (hwc->flags & PERF_X86_EVENT_AUTO_RELOAD) &&
+	    !(event->attr.sample_type & ~PEBS_FREERUNNING_FLAGS)) {
+		threshold = ds->pebs_absolute_maximum -
+			x86_pmu.max_pebs_events * x86_pmu.pebs_record_size;
+	} else {
+		threshold = ds->pebs_buffer_base + x86_pmu.pebs_record_size;
+	}
+	if (first_pebs || ds->pebs_interrupt_threshold > threshold)
+		ds->pebs_interrupt_threshold = threshold;
+
 	/* Use auto-reload if possible to save a MSR write in the PMI */
 	if (hwc->flags & PERF_X86_EVENT_AUTO_RELOAD) {
 		ds->pebs_event_reset[hwc->idx] =
-- 
1.8.3.2

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