Re: [PATCH v4 3/4] perf/core: Remove pmu linear searching code

[Marc Zyngier]

On Sat, 27 May 2023 00:00:47 +0100,
Ian Rogers <irogers@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> On Thu, May 25, 2023 at 8:56 AM Oliver Upton <oliver.upton@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> > On Thu, May 25, 2023 at 04:20:31PM +0200, Peter Zijlstra wrote:
> > > On Thu, May 25, 2023 at 07:11:41AM +0000, Oliver Upton wrote:
> > >
> > > > The PMUv3 driver does pass a name, but it relies on getting back an
> > > > allocated pmu id as @type is -1 in the call to perf_pmu_register().
> > > >
> > > > What actually broke is how KVM probes for a default core PMU to use for
> > > > a guest. kvm_pmu_probe_armpmu() creates a counter w/ PERF_TYPE_RAW and
> > > > reads the pmu from the returned perf_event. The linear search had the
> > > > effect of eventually stumbling on the correct core PMU and succeeding.
> > > >
> > > > Perf folks: is this WAI for heterogenous systems?
> > >
> > > TBH, I'm not sure. hetero and virt don't mix very well AFAIK and I'm not
> > > sure what ARM64 does here.
> > >
> > > IIRC the only way is to hard affine things; that is, force vCPU of
> > > 'type' to the pCPU mask of 'type' CPUs.
> >
> > We provide absolutely no illusion of consistency across implementations.
> > Userspace can select the PMU type, and then it is a userspace problem
> > affining vCPUs to the right pCPUs.
> >
> > And if they get that wrong, we just bail and refuse to run the vCPU.
> >
> > > If you don't do that; or let userspace 'override' that, things go
> > > sideways *real* fast.
> >
> > Oh yeah, and I wish PMUs were the only problem with these hetero
> > systems...
> 
> Just to add some context from what I understand. There are inbuilt
> type numbers for PMUs:
> https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/acme/linux.git/tree/include/uapi/linux/perf_event.h?h=perf-tools-next#n34
> so the PMU generally called /sys/devices/cpu should have type 4 (ARM
> give it another name). For heterogeneous ARM there is a single PMU and
> the same events are programmed regardless of whether it is a big or a
> little core - the cpumask lists all CPUs.

I think you misunderstood the way heterogeneous arm64 systems are
described . Each CPU type gets its own PMU type, and its own event
list. Case in point:

$ grep . /sys/devices/*pmu/{type,cpus}
/sys/devices/apple_avalanche_pmu/type:9
/sys/devices/apple_blizzard_pmu/type:8
/sys/devices/apple_avalanche_pmu/cpus:4-9
/sys/devices/apple_blizzard_pmu/cpus:0-3

Type 4 (aka PERF_EVENT_RAW) is AFAICT just a way to encode the raw
event number, nothing else.

Thanks,

	M.

-- 
Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible.