In layered_init, we're currently setting all bits in every layers'
cpumask, and then asynchronously updating the cpumasks at later time to
reflect their actual values at runtime. Now that we're updating the
layered code to initialize the cpumasks before we attach the scheduler,
we can instead have the init path actually refresh and initialize the
cpumasks directly.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
We currently have a bug in layered wherein we could fail to propagate
layer updates from user space to kernel space if a layer is never
adjusted after it's first initialized. For example, in the following
configuration:
[
{
"name": "workload.slice",
"comment": "main workload slice",
"matches": [
[
{
"CgroupPrefix": "workload.slice/"
}
]
],
"kind": {
"Grouped": {
"cpus_range": [30, 30],
"util_range": [
0.0,
1.0
],
"preempt": false
}
}
},
{
"name": "normal",
"comment": "the rest",
"matches": [
[]
],
"kind": {
"Grouped": {
"cpus_range": [2, 2],
"util_range": [
0.0,
1.0
],
"preempt": false
}
}
}
]
Both layers are static, and need only be resized a single time, so the
configuration would never be propagated to the kernel due to us never
calling update_bpf_layer_cpumask(). Let's instead have the
initialization propagate changes to the skeleton before we attach the
scheduler.
This has the advantage both of fixing the bug mentioned above where a
static configuration is never propagated to the kernel, and that we
don't have a short period when the scheduler is first attached where we
don't make optimal scheduling decisions due to the layer resizing not
being propagated.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
We currently panic! if we're building a Topology that detects more than
two siblings on a physical core. This can and will likely happen on
multi-socket machines. Given that we're planning to add support for
detecting NUMA nodes soon, let's just demote the panic! to a warn!.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
Add a command line option to enable/disable the sched-ext built-in idle
selection logic in the user-space scheduler.
With this option the user-space scheduler will try to dispatch tasks on
the CPU selected during the .select_cpu() phase (using the built-in idle
selection logic).
Without this option the user-space scheduler will try to dispatch tasks
to the first CPU available.
The former can be useful to improve throughput, since tasks are more
likely to stick on the same CPU, while the latter can provide better
system responsiveness, especially when the system is significantly busy.
Given that, by default, tasks can be dispatched directly bypassing the
user-space scheduler if an idle CPU is found during .select_cpu(), the
user-space scheduler is primarily engaged only when the system is busy
(no idle CPUs are available). Under these circumstances, it is typically
more efficient to dispatch tasks on the first available CPU. Hence, the
default behavior is to ignore built-in idle selection logic in the
user-space scheduler.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Checking if a CPU is idle or busy in the user-space scheduler is a bit
redundant, considering that we also rely on the built-in idle selection
logic in the BPF part.
Therefore get rid of the additional idle selection logic in the
user-space scheduler and rely on the built-in idle selection.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Introduce an option to send all scheduling events and actions to
user-space, disabling any form of in-kernel optimization.
Enabling this option will likely make the system less responsive (but
more predictable in terms of performance) and it can be useful for
debugging purposes.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
scx_rusty has logic in the scheduler to inspect the host to
automatically build scheduling domains across every L3 cache. This would
be generically useful for many different types of schedulers, so let's
add it to the scx_utils crate so it can be used by others.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
The buffer used to store struct queued_task_ctx items fetched from the
BPF ring buffer needs to be aligned to the architecture register size,
otherwise we may hit misaligned pointer dereference issues, such as:
thread 'main' panicked at src/bpf.rs:162:43:
misaligned pointer dereference: address must be a multiple of 0x8 but is 0x56516a51e004
note: run with `RUST_BACKTRACE=1` environment variable to display a backtrace
Prevent this by making sure the buffer is always aligned to 64-bits.
Fixes: 93dc615 ("scx_rustland: use a ring buffer for queued tasks")
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Switch from a BPF_MAP_TYPE_QUEUE to a BPF_MAP_TYPE_RINGBUF to store the
tasks that need to be processed by the user-space scheduler.
A ring buffer allows to save a lot of memory copies and syscalls, since
the memory is directly shared between the BPF and the user-space
components.
Performance profile before this change:
2.44% [kernel] [k] __memset
2.19% [kernel] [k] __sys_bpf
1.59% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_alloc_node
1.00% [kernel] [k] _copy_from_user
After this change:
1.42% [kernel] [k] __memset
0.14% [kernel] [k] __sys_bpf
0.10% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_alloc_node
0.07% [kernel] [k] _copy_from_user
Both the overhead of sys_bpf() and copy_from_user() are reduced by a
factor of ~15x now (only the dispatch path is using sys_bpf() now).
NOTE: despite being very effective, the current implementation is a bit
of a hack. This is because the present ring buffer API exclusively
permits consumption in a greedy manner, where multiple items can be
consumed simultaneously. However, libbpf-rs does not provide precise
information regarding the exact number of items consumed. By utilizing a
more refined libbpf-rs API [1] we may be able to improve this code a
bit.
Moreover, libbpf-rs doesn't provide an API for the user_ring_buffer, so
at the moment there's not a trivial way to apply the same change to the
dispatched tasks.
However, just with this change applied, the overhead of sys_bpf() and
copy_from_user() is already minimal, so we won't get much benefits by
changing the dispatch path to use a BPF ring buffer.
[1] https://github.com/libbpf/libbpf-rs/pull/680
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Instead of using a BPF_MAP_TYPE_ARRAY to store which tasks are running
on which CPU we can simply use a global array, mapped in the user-space
address space.
In this way we can avoid a lot of memory copies and call to sys_bpf(),
significantly reducing the scheduler's overhead.
Keep in mind that we don't need to be 100% correct while accessing this
information, so we can accept some fuzziness in order to significantly
reduce the scheduler's overhead.
Performance profile before this change:
5.52% [kernel] [k] __sys_bpf
4.84% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_alloc_node
4.71% [kernel] [k] map_lookup_elem
4.10% [kernel] [k] _copy_from_user
3.51% [kernel] [k] bpf_map_copy_value
3.12% [kernel] [k] check_heap_object
After this change:
2.20% [kernel] [k] __sys_bpf
1.91% [kernel] [k] map_lookup_and_delete_elem
1.60% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_alloc_node
1.10% [kernel] [k] _copy_from_user
0.12% [kernel] [k] check_heap_object
n/a bpf_map_copy_value
n/a map_lookup_elem
With this change we can reduce the overhead of sys_bpf() by ~2x and
the overhead of copy_from_user() by ~4x.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
We have moved generic sched-ext status files outside of debugfs, so that
kernels without SCHED_DEBUG enabled can also access this information.
However, the README.md file is still showing the old ABI in an example.
Replace it with the new sysfs interface to avoid confusion.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Use c_char to convert C strings, that is more portable across different
architectures.
This prevents a build failure on arm64 and ppc64el.
Fixes: d57a23f ("rust/scx_utils: Add user_exit_info support")
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Currently, the primary bottleneck in scx_rustland lies within its custom
memory allocator, which is used to prevent page faults in the user-space
scheduler.
This is pretty evident looking at perf top:
39.95% scx_rustland [.] <scx_rustland::bpf::alloc::RustLandAllocator as core::alloc::global::GlobalAlloc>::alloc
3.41% [kernel] [k] _copy_from_user
3.20% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_alloc_node
2.59% [kernel] [k] __sys_bpf
2.30% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_free
1.48% libc.so.6 [.] syscall
1.45% [kernel] [k] __virt_addr_valid
1.42% scx_rustland [.] <scx_rustland::bpf::alloc::RustLandAllocator as core::alloc::global::GlobalAlloc>::dealloc
1.31% [kernel] [k] _copy_to_user
1.23% [kernel] [k] entry_SYSRETQ_unsafe_stack
However, there's no need to reinvent the wheel here, rather than relying
on an overly simplistic and inefficient allocator, we can rely on
buddy-alloc [1], which is also capable of operating on a preallocated
memory buffer.
After switching to buddy-alloc, the performance profile under the same
workload conditions looks like the following:
6.01% [kernel] [k] _copy_from_user
5.21% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_alloc_node
4.45% [kernel] [k] __sys_bpf
3.80% [kernel] [k] __kmem_cache_free
2.79% libc.so.6 [.] syscall
2.34% [kernel] [k] __virt_addr_valid
2.26% [kernel] [k] _copy_to_user
2.14% [kernel] [k] __check_heap_object
2.10% [kernel] [k] __check_object_size.part.0
2.02% [kernel] [k] entry_SYSRETQ_unsafe_stack
With this change in place, the primary overhead is now moved to the
bpf() syscall and the copies between kernel and user-space (this could
potentially be optimized in the future using BPF ring buffers, instead
of BPF FIFO queues).
A better focus at the allocator overhead before vs after this change:
[before]
39.95% scx_rustland [.] core::alloc::global::GlobalAlloc>::alloc
1.42% scx_rustland [.] core::alloc::global::GlobalAlloc>::dealloc
[after]
1.50% scx_rustland [.] core::alloc::global::GlobalAlloc>::alloc
0.76% scx_rustland [.] core::alloc::global::GlobalAlloc>::dealloc
[1] https://crates.io/crates/buddy-alloc
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
In order to prevent duplicate PIDs in the TaskTree (BTreeSet), we
perform an O(N) search each time we add an item, to verify whether the
PID already exists or not.
Under heavy stress test conditions the O(N) complexity can have a
potential impact on the overall performance.
To mitigate this, introduce a HashMap that can be used to retrieve tasks
by PID typically with a O(1) complexity. This could potentially degrade
to O(N) in presence of hash collisions, but even in this case, accessing
the hash map is still more efficient than scanning all the entries in
the BTreeSet to search for the target PID.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Introduce a per-task generation counter to check the validity of the
cpumask at dispatch time.
The logic is the following:
- the cpumask generation number is incremented every time a task
calls .set_cpumask()
- when a task is enqueued the current generation number is stored in
the queued_task_ctx and relayed to the user-space scheduler
- the user-space scheduler can decide to dispatch the task on the CPU
determined by the BPF layer in .select_cpu(), redirect the task to
any other specific CPU, or redirect to the first CPU available (using
NO_CPU)
- task is then dispatched back to the BPF code along with its cpumask
generation counter
- at dispatch time the BPF code checks if the generation number is the
same and it discards the dispatch attempt if the cpumask is not valid
anymore (the task will be automatically re-enqueued by the sched-ext
core code, potentially selecting another CPU / cpumask)
- if the cpumask is valid, but the CPU selected by the user-space
scheduler is invalid (according to the cpumask), the task will be
transparently bounced by the BPF code to the shared DSQ (in this way
the user-space code can be completely abstracted and dispatches that
target invalid CPUs can be automatically fixed by the BPF layer)
This solution can prevent stalls due to dispatches targeting invalid
CPUs and it can also avoid redundant dispatch events, making the code
more efficient and the cpumask interlocking more reliable.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
As described in [0], there is an open problem in load balancing called
the "infeasible weights" problem. Essentially, the problem boils down to
the fact that a task with disproportionately high load can be granted
more CPU time than they can actually consume per their duty cycle.
This patch implements a solution to that problem, wherein we apply the
algorithm described in this paper to adjust all infeasible weights in
the system down to a feasible wight that gives them their full duty
cycle, while allowing the remaining feasible tasks on the system to
share the remaining compute capacity on the machine.
[0]: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fAoWUlmW-HTp6akuATVpMxpUpvWcGSAv/view?usp=drive_link
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
Dispatch to the shared DSQ (NO_CPU) only when the assigned CPU is not
idle anymore, otherwise maintain the same CPU that has been assigned by
the BPF layer.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
When the system is not being fully utilized there may be delays in
promptly awakening the user-space scheduler.
This can happen for example, when some CPU-intensive tasks are
constantly dispatched bypassing the user-space scheduler (e.g., using
SCX_DSQ_LOCAL) and other CPUs are completely idle.
Under this condition the update_idle() can fail to activate the
user-space scheduler, because there are no pending events, and only the
periodic timer will wake up the scheduler, potentially introducing lags
of up to 1 sec.
This can be reproduced, for example, running a video game that doesn't
use all the CPUs available in the system (i.e., Team Fortress 2). With
this game it is pretty easy to notice sporadic lags that are resumed
after ~1sec, due to the periodic timer kicking scheduler.
To prevent this from happening wake up the user-space scheduler
immediately as soon as a CPU is released, speculating on the fact that
most of the time there will be always another task ready to run.
This can introduce a little more overhead in the scheduler (due to
potential unnecessary wake up events), but it also prevents stuttery
behaviors and it makes the system much more smooth and responsive,
especially with video games.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Use scx_bpf_dispatch_cancel() to invalidate dispatches on wrong per-CPU
DSQ, due to cpumask race conditions, and redirect them to the shared
DSQ.
This prevents dispatching tasks to CPU that cannot be used according to
the task's cpumask.
With this applied the scheduler passed all the `stress-ng --race-sched`
stress tests.
Moreover, introduce a counter that is periodically reported to stdout as
an additional statistic, that can be helpful for debugging.
Link: https://github.com/sched-ext/sched_ext/pull/135
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
Print all the scheduler statistics before exiting. Reporting the very
last state of the scheduler can help to debug events that could trigger
error conditions (such as page faults, scheduler congestions, etc.).
While at it, fix also some minor coding style issues (tabs vs spaces).
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
SCX_KICK_IDLE is a new feature which isn't defined in older kernels. Add
compat wrapper and use it for idle CPU wakeups.
Signed-off-by: Tejun Heo <tj@kernel.org>
Search for potential errors only in the kernel logs and the scheduler
stderr.
In this way we can use "error keywords" in the scheduler's output
without triggering false positives in the CI (see for example #127).
NOTE: this works, because virtme-ng, when executed in verbose mode,
sends the kernel messages to stderr (together with the command's stderr)
and it channels the command's stdout to the stdout of the host.
Signed-off-by: Andrea Righi <andrea.righi@canonical.com>
This is meant to be an example scheduler that won't necessarily run well
in production. Let's remove the 3 second timeout and use the system
default of 30.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
We're basically always runnin two CI jobs: one for a remote push, and
another for when a PR is opened. These are essentially measuring the
same thing, so let's save CI bandwidth and just do a PR run. This will
hopefully make things a bit less noisy as well.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
Let's make it clear that this scheduler isn't expected to perform well,
and instead point people to scx_rustland.
Signed-off-by: David Vernet <void@manifault.com>
