Re: [PATCH v4] zswap: memcontrol: implement zswap writeback disabling

[Nhat Pham <nphamcs@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Nov 11, 2023 at 10:22 AM Chris Li <chrisl@kernel.org> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Nov 10, 2023 at 4:10 PM Nhat Pham <nphamcs@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > I notice the bool is between two integers.
> > > mem_cgroup structure has a few bool sprinkle in different locations.
> > > Arrange them together might save a few padding bytes. We can also
> > > consider using bit fields.
> > > It is a very minor point, the condition also exists before your change.
> >
> > This sounds like an optimization worthy of its own patch. Two random
> > thoughts however:
>
> Sure. I consider this a very minor point as well.
>
> >
> > a) Can this be done at the compiler level? I believe you can reduce
> > the padding required by sorting the fields of a struct by its size, correct?
> > That sounds like a job that a compiler should do for us...
>
> According to the C standard, the struct member should be layered out
> in the order it was declared. There are too many codes that assume the
> first member has the same address of the struct. Consider we use
> struct for DMA descriptor as well, where the memory layout needs to
> match the underlying hardware. Re-ordering the members will be really
> bad there. There are gcc extensions to do structure member
> randomization. But the randomization layout is determined by the
> randomization seed. The compiler actually doesn't have the flexibility
> to rearrange the member orders to reduce the padding either.
>

Ah I see. Yeah then it might be worth tweaking around manually.
But yeah, we should do this separately from this patch.

> >
> > b) Re: the bitfield idea, some of the fields are CONFIG-dependent (well
> > like this one). Might be a bit hairier to do it...
>
> You can declare the bit field under preprocessor condition as well,
> just like a normal declare. Can you clarify why it is more hairier?
> The bitfield does not have a pointer address associated with it, the
> compiler can actually move the bit field bits around. You get the
> compiler to do it for you in this case.

I see hmmm.

>
> >
> > >
> > > >  #endif /* _LINUX_ZSWAP_H */
> > > > diff --git a/mm/memcontrol.c b/mm/memcontrol.c
> > > > index e43b5aba8efc..9cb3ea912cbe 100644
> > > > --- a/mm/memcontrol.c
> > > > +++ b/mm/memcontrol.c
> > > > @@ -5545,6 +5545,11 @@ mem_cgroup_css_alloc(struct cgroup_subsys_state *parent_css)
> > > >         WRITE_ONCE(memcg->soft_limit, PAGE_COUNTER_MAX);
> > > >  #if defined(CONFIG_MEMCG_KMEM) && defined(CONFIG_ZSWAP)
> > > >         memcg->zswap_max = PAGE_COUNTER_MAX;
> > > > +
> > > > +       if (parent)
> > > > +               WRITE_ONCE(memcg->zswap_writeback, READ_ONCE(parent->zswap_writeback));
> > > > +       else
> > > > +               WRITE_ONCE(memcg->zswap_writeback, true);
> > >
> > > You can combine this two WRITE_ONCE to one
> > >
> > > bool writeback = !parent ||   READ_ONCE(parent->zswap_writeback);
> > > WRITE_ONCE(memcg->zswap_writeback, writeback);
> > >
> >
> > Yeah I originally did something similar, but then decided to do the if-else
> > instead. Honest no strong preference here - just felt that the if-else was
> > cleaner at that moment.
>
> One WRITE_ONCE will produce slightly better machine code as less
> memory store instructions. Normally the compiler is allowed to do the
> common expression elimination to merge the write. However here it has
> explicite WRITE_ONCE, so the compiler has to place two memory stores
> instructions, because you have two WRITE_ONCE. My suggestion will only
> have one memory store instruction. I agree it is micro optimization.
>

Ohh I did not think about this. Seems like my original version was more
than just a clever one-liner haha.

It's a bit of a micro-optimization indeed. But if for some reason I need
to send v5 or a fixlet, I'll keep this in mind!

Thanks for the explanation, Chris!

> Chris