Re: [PATCH v2 6/6] slub: only preallocate cpus_with_slabs if offstack

[Gilad Ben-Yossef <gilad@benyossef.com>]

On Fri, Oct 28, 2011 at 6:06 AM, Christoph Lameter <cl@gentwo.org> wrote:
> On Sun, 23 Oct 2011, Gilad Ben-Yossef wrote:
>
>> We need a cpumask to track cpus with per cpu cache pages
>> to know which cpu to whack during flush_all. For
>> CONFIG_CPUMASK_OFFSTACK=n we allocate the mask on stack.
>> For CONFIG_CPUMASK_OFFSTACK=y we don't want to call kmalloc
>> on the flush_all path, so we preallocate per kmem_cache
>> on cache creation and use it in flush_all.
>
> I think the on stack alloc should be the default because we can then avoid
> the field in kmem_cache and the associated logic with managing the field.
> Can we do a GFP_ATOMIC allocation in flush_all()? If the alloc
> fails then you can still fallback to send an IPI to all cpus.


Yes, that was exactly what I did in the first version of this patch
did. See: https://lkml.org/lkml/2011/9/25/32

Pekka E. did not like it because of the allocation out of kmem_cache
in CONFIG_CPUMASK_OFFSTACK=y case in a code path that is supposed to
shrink kmem_caches. I have to say I certainly see his point so I tried
to work around that. On the other hand the overhead code complexity
wise of avoiding that allocation is non trivial.

I tried to give it some more thought -

Since flush_all is called on a kmem_cache basis, to allocate off of
the cpumask kmem_cache while shrinking *another cache* is fine. A
little weird maybe, but fine.

Trouble might lurk if some code path will try to shrink the cpumask
kmem_cache. This can happens if a code path ever tries to either close
the cpumask kmem_cache, which I find very unlikely, or if someone will
try to shrink the cpumask kmem_cache. Right now the only in tree user
I found of kmem_shrink_cache is the acpi code, and even that happens
only for a few specific caches and only during boot. I don't see that
changing.

I think if it is up to me, I recommend going the simpler  route that
does the allocation in flush_all using GFP_ATOMIC for
CPUMASK_OFFSTACK=y and sends an IPI to all CPUs if it fails, because
it is simpler code and in the end I believe it is also correct.

What do you guys think?

Thanks!
Gilad
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Gilad Ben-Yossef
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gilad@benyossef.com
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"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Goto statements used to
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