[PATCH 04/10] x86/intel_rdt: Cache Allocation documentation and cgroup usage guide

[Vikas Shivappa]

Adds a description of Cache allocation technology, overview
of kernel implementation and usage of Cache Allocation cgroup interface.

Cache allocation is a sub-feature of Resource Director Technology(RDT)
Allocation or Platform Shared resource control which provides support to
control Platform shared resources like L3 cache.  Currently L3 Cache is
the only resource that is supported in RDT.  More information can be
found in the Intel SDM, Volume 3, section 17.15.

Cache Allocation Technology provides a way for the Software (OS/VMM)
to restrict cache allocation to a defined 'subset' of cache which may
be overlapping with other 'subsets'.  This feature is used when
allocating a line in cache ie when pulling new data into the cache.

Signed-off-by: Vikas Shivappa <vikas.shivappa@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
---
 Documentation/cgroups/rdt.txt | 215 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 215 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 Documentation/cgroups/rdt.txt

diff --git a/Documentation/cgroups/rdt.txt b/Documentation/cgroups/rdt.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..dfff477
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Documentation/cgroups/rdt.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,215 @@
+        RDT
+        ---
+
+Copyright (C) 2014 Intel Corporation
+Written by vikas.shivappa@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
+(based on contents and format from cpusets.txt)
+
+CONTENTS:
+=========
+
+1. Cache Allocation Technology
+  1.1 What is RDT and Cache allocation ?
+  1.2 Why is Cache allocation needed ?
+  1.3 Cache allocation implementation overview
+  1.4 Assignment of CBM and CLOS
+  1.5 Scheduling and Context Switch
+2. Usage Examples and Syntax
+
+1. Cache Allocation Technology(Cache allocation)
+===================================
+
+1.1 What is RDT and Cache allocation
+------------------------------------
+
+Cache allocation is a sub-feature of Resource Director Technology(RDT)
+Allocation or Platform Shared resource control which provides support to
+control Platform shared resources like L3 cache.  Currently L3 Cache is
+the only resource that is supported in RDT.  More information can be
+found in the Intel SDM, Volume 3, section 17.15.
+
+Cache Allocation Technology provides a way for the Software (OS/VMM)
+to restrict cache allocation to a defined 'subset' of cache which may
+be overlapping with other 'subsets'.  This feature is used when
+allocating a line in cache ie when pulling new data into the cache.
+The programming of the h/w is done via programming  MSRs.
+
+The different cache subsets are identified by CLOS identifier (class
+of service) and each CLOS has a CBM (cache bit mask).  The CBM is a
+contiguous set of bits which defines the amount of cache resource that
+is available for each 'subset'.
+
+1.2 Why is Cache allocation needed
+----------------------------------
+
+In todays new processors the number of cores is continuously increasing,
+especially in large scale usage models where VMs are used like
+webservers and datacenters. The number of cores increase the number
+of threads or workloads that can simultaneously be run. When
+multi-threaded-applications, VMs, workloads run concurrently they
+compete for shared resources including L3 cache.
+
+The Cache allocation  enables more cache resources to be made available
+for higher priority applications based on guidance from the execution
+environment.
+
+The architecture also allows dynamically changing these subsets during
+runtime to further optimize the performance of the higher priority
+application with minimal degradation to the low priority app.
+Additionally, resources can be rebalanced for system throughput benefit.
+
+This technique may be useful in managing large computer systems which
+large L3 cache. Examples may be large servers running  instances of
+webservers or database servers. In such complex systems, these subsets
+can be used for more careful placing of the available cache
+resources.
+
+1.3 Cache allocation implementation Overview
+--------------------------------------------
+
+Kernel implements a cgroup subsystem to support cache allocation.
+
+Each cgroup has a CLOSid <-> CBM(cache bit mask) mapping.
+A CLOS(Class of service) is represented by a CLOSid.CLOSid is internal
+to the kernel and not exposed to user.  Each cgroup would have one CBM
+and would just represent one cache 'subset'.
+
+The cgroup follows cgroup hierarchy ,mkdir and adding tasks to the
+cgroup never fails.  When a child cgroup is created it inherits the
+CLOSid and the CBM from its parent.  When a user changes the default
+CBM for a cgroup, a new CLOSid may be allocated if the CBM was not
+used before.  The changing of 'l3_cache_mask' may fail with -ENOSPC once
+the kernel runs out of maximum CLOSids it can support.
+User can create as many cgroups as he wants but having different CBMs
+at the same time is restricted by the maximum number of CLOSids
+(multiple cgroups can have the same CBM).
+Kernel maintains a CLOSid<->cbm mapping which keeps reference counter
+for each cgroup using a CLOSid.
+
+The tasks in the cgroup would get to fill the L3 cache represented by
+the cgroup's 'l3_cache_mask' file.
+
+Root directory would have all available  bits set in 'l3_cache_mask' file
+by default.
+
+Each RDT cgroup directory has the following files. Some of them may be a
+part of common RDT framework or be specific to RDT sub-features like
+cache allocation.
+
+ - intel_rdt.l3_cache_mask: The cache bitmask(CBM) is represented by this
+ file. The bitmask must be contiguous and would have a 1 or 2 bit
+ minimum length.
+
+1.4 Assignment of CBM,CLOS
+--------------------------
+
+The 'l3_cache_mask' needs to be a  subset of the parent node's
+'l3_cache_mask'. Any contiguous subset of these bits(with a minimum of 2
+bits on hsw SKUs) maybe set to indicate the cache mapping desired. The
+'l3_cache_mask' between 2 directories can overlap. The 'l3_cache_mask' would
+represent the cache 'subset' of the Cache allocation cgroup. For ex: on
+a system with 16 bits of max cbm bits, if the directory has the least
+significant 4 bits set in its 'l3_cache_mask' file(meaning the 'l3_cache_mask'
+is just 0xf), it would be allocated the right quarter of the Last level
+cache which means the tasks belonging to this Cache allocation cgroup
+can use the right quarter of the cache to fill. If it
+has the most significant 8 bits set ,it would be allocated the left
+half of the cache(8 bits  out of 16 represents 50%).
+
+The cache portion defined in the CBM file is available to all tasks
+within the cgroup to fill and these task are not allowed to allocate
+space in other parts of the cache.
+
+1.5 Scheduling and Context Switch
+---------------------------------
+
+During context switch kernel implements this by writing the
+CLOSid (internally maintained by kernel) of the cgroup to which the
+task belongs to the CPU's IA32_PQR_ASSOC MSR. The MSR is only written
+when there is a change in the CLOSid for the CPU in order to minimize
+the latency incurred during context switch.
+
+The following considerations are done for the PQR MSR write so that it
+has minimal impact on scheduling hot path:
+- This path doesnt exist on any non-intel platforms.
+- On Intel platforms, this would not exist by default unless CGROUP_RDT
+is enabled.
+- remains a no-op when CGROUP_RDT is enabled and intel hardware does not
+support the feature.
+- When feature is available, still remains a no-op till the user
+manually creates a cgroup *and* assigns a new cache mask. Since the
+child node inherits the parents cache mask , by cgroup creation there is
+no scheduling hot path impact from the new cgroup.
+- per cpu PQR values are cached and the MSR write is only done when
+there is a task with different PQR is scheduled on the CPU. Typically if
+the task groups are bound to be scheduled on a set of CPUs , the number
+of MSR writes is greatly reduced.
+
+2. Usage examples and syntax
+============================
+
+To check if Cache allocation was enabled on your system
+
+dmesg | grep -i intel_rdt
+should output : intel_rdt: Max bitmask length: xx,Max ClosIds: xx
+the length of l3_cache_mask and CLOS should depend on the system you use.
+
+Also /proc/cpuinfo would have rdt(if rdt is enabled) and cat_l3( if L3
+    cache allocation is enabled).
+
+Following would mount the cache allocation cgroup subsystem and create
+2 directories. Please refer to Documentation/cgroups/cgroups.txt on
+details about how to use cgroups.
+
+  cd /sys/fs/cgroup
+  mkdir rdt
+  mount -t cgroup -ointel_rdt intel_rdt /sys/fs/cgroup/rdt
+  cd rdt
+
+Create 2 rdt cgroups
+
+  mkdir group1
+  mkdir group2
+
+Following are some of the Files in the directory
+
+  ls
+  rdt.l3_cache_mask
+  tasks
+
+Say if the cache is 2MB and cbm supports 16 bits, then setting the
+below allocates the 'right 1/4th(512KB)' of the cache to group2
+
+Edit the CBM for group2 to set the least significant 4 bits.  This
+allocates 'right quarter' of the cache.
+
+  cd group2
+  /bin/echo 0xf > rdt.l3_cache_mask
+
+
+Edit the CBM for group2 to set the least significant 8 bits.This
+allocates the right half of the cache to 'group2'.
+
+  cd group2
+  /bin/echo 0xff > rdt.l3_cache_mask
+
+Assign tasks to the group2
+
+  /bin/echo PID1 > tasks
+  /bin/echo PID2 > tasks
+
+  Meaning now threads
+  PID1 and PID2 get to fill the 'right half' of
+  the cache as the belong to cgroup group2.
+
+Create a group under group2
+
+  cd group2
+  mkdir group21
+  cat rdt.l3_cache_mask
+   0xff - inherits parents mask.
+
+  /bin/echo 0xfff > rdt.l3_cache_mask - throws error as mask has to parent's mask's subset
+
+In order to restrict RDT cgroups to specific set of CPUs rdt can be
+comounted with cpusets.
-- 
1.9.1

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