Re: [PATCHES/RFC] Re: A concern about overflow ring buffer mode

[Liang, Kan]

On 10/29/2018 9:03 AM, Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo wrote:
> Em Fri, Oct 26, 2018 at 04:11:51PM -0400, Liang, Kan escreveu:
> > On 10/26/2018 3:24 PM, Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo wrote:
> > > Em Fri, Oct 26, 2018 at 03:16:29PM -0400, Liang, Kan escreveu:
> > > > On 10/26/2018 3:12 PM, Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo wrote:
> > > > > Em Fri, Oct 26, 2018 at 03:07:40PM -0400, Liang, Kan escreveu:
> > > > > > On 10/26/2018 3:02 PM, Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo wrote:
> > > > > I checked and both have the same result. But I still think there is
> > > > > value in having the shorter form, ok?
>
> > > > Sure.
>
> > > Ok.
>
> > > I think that we should default back to --no-overwrite till we get this
> > > sorted out, as the effect is easily noticeable, as David reported and I
> > > reproduced, when doing kernel builds.
>   
> > It is mainly for performance reason to switch to overwrite mode. The impact
> > was very small when I did my test. But now the effect is easily noticeable
> > in other tests. Yes, I agree. We may change it back to non-overwrite mode
> > until the issue is addressed.
>
> So, I have these two patches in my perf/core branch, with Fixes tags
> that will make them get to the stable kernels, ok?

I just realized that the problem in KNL will be back if we switch back 
to non-overwrite mode.
The problem is that users have to wait tens of minutes to see perf top 
results on the screen in KNL. Before that, there is nothing but a black 
screen.

Sorry I didn't notice it last Friday. Because I thought the ui_warning 
in perf_top__mmap_read() can give user a hint. So the user can switch to 
overwrite mode manually.
But unfortunately, the ui_warning doesn't work. Because it is called 
after perf_top__mmap_read(). The processing time of 
perf_top__mmap_read() could be tens of minutes.

Thanks,
Kan

>  From f54ef0e7342efb77205b2faaacbcb81cdd31f064 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
> From: Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo <acme@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Date: Fri, 26 Oct 2018 15:55:23 -0300
> Subject: [PATCH 1/2] perf top: Allow disabling the overwrite mode
>
> In ebebbf082357 ("perf top: Switch default mode to overwrite mode") we
> forgot to leave a way to disable that new default, add a --overwrite
> option that can be disabled using --no-overwrite, since the code already
> in such a way that we can readily disable this mode.
>
> This is useful when investigating bugs with this mode like the recent
> report from David Miller where lots of unknown symbols appear due to
> disabling the events while processing them which disables all record
> types, not just PERF_RECORD_SAMPLE, which makes it impossible to resolve
> maps when we lose PERF_RECORD_MMAP records.
>
> This can be easily seen while building a kernel, when there are lots of
> short lived processes.
>
> Reported-by: David Miller <davem@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Acked-by: Kan Liang <kan.liang@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Adrian Hunter <adrian.hunter@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Andi Kleen <ak@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: David Ahern <dsahern@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Jin Yao <yao.jin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Jiri Olsa <jolsa@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Namhyung Kim <namhyung@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Wang Nan <wangnan0@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Fixes: ebebbf082357 ("perf top: Switch default mode to overwrite mode")
> Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/n/tip-oqgsz2bq4kgrnnajrafcdhie@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Signed-off-by: Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo <acme@xxxxxxxxxx>
> ---
>   tools/perf/Documentation/perf-top.txt | 5 +++++
>   tools/perf/builtin-top.c              | 2 ++
>   2 files changed, 7 insertions(+)
>
> diff --git a/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-top.txt b/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-top.txt
> index 114fda12aa49..d4be6061fe1c 100644
> --- a/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-top.txt
> +++ b/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-top.txt
> @@ -242,6 +242,11 @@ Default is to monitor all CPUS.
>   --hierarchy::
>   	Enable hierarchy output.
>   
> +--overwrite::
> +	This is the default, but for investigating problems with it or any other strange
> +	behaviour like lots of unknown samples, we may want to disable this mode by using
> +	--no-overwrite.
> +
>   --force::
>   	Don't do ownership validation.
>   
> diff --git a/tools/perf/builtin-top.c b/tools/perf/builtin-top.c
> index d21d8751e749..214fad747b04 100644
> --- a/tools/perf/builtin-top.c
> +++ b/tools/perf/builtin-top.c
> @@ -1372,6 +1372,8 @@ int cmd_top(int argc, const char **argv)
>   		    "Show raw trace event output (do not use print fmt or plugins)"),
>   	OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "hierarchy", &symbol_conf.report_hierarchy,
>   		    "Show entries in a hierarchy"),
> +	OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "overwrite", &top.record_opts.overwrite,
> +		    "Use a backward ring buffer, default: yes"),
>   	OPT_BOOLEAN(0, "force", &symbol_conf.force, "don't complain, do it"),
>   	OPT_UINTEGER(0, "num-thread-synthesize", &top.nr_threads_synthesize,
>   			"number of thread to run event synthesize"),