Re: [PATCH] Powerpc/perf: Wire up PMI throttling

From: Michael Ellerman
Date: Thu Nov 15 2018 - 07:43:46 EST


Ravi Bangoria <ravi.bangoria@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> Commit 14c63f17b1fde ("perf: Drop sample rate when sampling is too
> slow") introduced a way to throttle PMU interrupts if we're spending
> too much time just processing those. Wire up powerpc PMI handler to
> use this infrastructure.

To be clear we have throttling of the *rate* of interrupts, but this
adds throttling based on the *time taken* to process the interrupts. Or
at least that's my understanding?

> diff --git a/arch/powerpc/kernel/traps.c b/arch/powerpc/kernel/traps.c
> index 9a86572db1ef..44f85fa22356 100644
> --- a/arch/powerpc/kernel/traps.c
> +++ b/arch/powerpc/kernel/traps.c
> @@ -18,6 +18,7 @@
> #include <linux/errno.h>
> #include <linux/sched.h>
> #include <linux/sched/debug.h>
> +#include <linux/sched/clock.h>
> #include <linux/kernel.h>
> #include <linux/mm.h>
> #include <linux/pkeys.h>
> @@ -1803,9 +1804,12 @@ void vsx_unavailable_tm(struct pt_regs *regs)
>
> void performance_monitor_exception(struct pt_regs *regs)
> {
> + u64 start_clock;
> __this_cpu_inc(irq_stat.pmu_irqs);
>
> + start_clock = sched_clock();
> perf_irq(regs);
> + perf_sample_event_took(sched_clock() - start_clock);
> }

Despite the name, perf_irq() may not actually be the perf IRQ handler :)

It's a function pointer which might call perf or might call oprofile, or
a dummy handler.

I don't think we should be calling perf_sample_event_took() if we're not
actually using perf, that is wasteful at best.

So the timing logic should go in the perf specific handler I think.
ie. perf_event_interrupt().

cheers