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Paul E. McKenney 2be57f7328 rcu: Weaken ->dynticks accesses and updates
Accesses to the rcu_data structure's ->dynticks field have always been
fully ordered because it was not possible to prove that weaker ordering
was safe.  However, with the removal of the rcu_eqs_special_set() function
and the advent of the Linux-kernel memory model, it is now easy to show
that two of the four original full memory barriers can be weakened to
acquire and release operations.  The remaining pair must remain full
memory barriers.  This change makes the memory ordering requirements
more evident, and it might well also speed up the to-idle and from-idle
fastpaths on some architectures.

The following litmus test, adapted from one supplied off-list by Frederic
Weisbecker, models the RCU grace-period kthread detecting an idle CPU
that is concurrently transitioning to non-idle:

	C dynticks-from-idle

	{
		DYNTICKS=0; (* Initially idle. *)
	}

	P0(int *X, int *DYNTICKS)
	{
		int dynticks;
		int x;

		// Idle.
		dynticks = READ_ONCE(*DYNTICKS);
		smp_store_release(DYNTICKS, dynticks + 1);
		smp_mb();
		// Now non-idle
		x = READ_ONCE(*X);
	}

	P1(int *X, int *DYNTICKS)
	{
		int dynticks;

		WRITE_ONCE(*X, 1);
		smp_mb();
		dynticks = smp_load_acquire(DYNTICKS);
	}

	exists (1:dynticks=0 /\ 0:x=1)

Running "herd7 -conf linux-kernel.cfg dynticks-from-idle.litmus" verifies
this transition, namely, showing that if the RCU grace-period kthread (P1)
sees another CPU as idle (P0), then any memory access prior to the start
of the grace period (P1's write to X) will be seen by any RCU read-side
critical section following the to-non-idle transition (P0's read from X).
This is a straightforward use of full memory barriers to force ordering
in a store-buffering (SB) litmus test.

The following litmus test, also adapted from the one supplied off-list
by Frederic Weisbecker, models the RCU grace-period kthread detecting
a non-idle CPU that is concurrently transitioning to idle:

	C dynticks-into-idle

	{
		DYNTICKS=1; (* Initially non-idle. *)
	}

	P0(int *X, int *DYNTICKS)
	{
		int dynticks;

		// Non-idle.
		WRITE_ONCE(*X, 1);
		dynticks = READ_ONCE(*DYNTICKS);
		smp_store_release(DYNTICKS, dynticks + 1);
		smp_mb();
		// Now idle.
	}

	P1(int *X, int *DYNTICKS)
	{
		int x;
		int dynticks;

		smp_mb();
		dynticks = smp_load_acquire(DYNTICKS);
		x = READ_ONCE(*X);
	}

	exists (1:dynticks=2 /\ 1:x=0)

Running "herd7 -conf linux-kernel.cfg dynticks-into-idle.litmus" verifies
this transition, namely, showing that if the RCU grace-period kthread
(P1) sees another CPU as newly idle (P0), then any pre-idle memory access
(P0's write to X) will be seen by any code following the grace period
(P1's read from X).  This is a simple release-acquire pair forcing
ordering in a message-passing (MP) litmus test.

Of course, if the grace-period kthread detects the CPU as non-idle,
it will refrain from reporting a quiescent state on behalf of that CPU,
so there are no ordering requirements from the grace-period kthread in
that case.  However, other subsystems call rcu_is_idle_cpu() to check
for CPUs being non-idle from an RCU perspective.  That case is also
verified by the above litmus tests with the proviso that the sense of
the low-order bit of the DYNTICKS counter be inverted.

Unfortunately, on x86 smp_mb() is as expensive as a cache-local atomic
increment.  This commit therefore weakens only the read from ->dynticks.
However, the updates are abstracted into a rcu_dynticks_inc() function
to ease any future changes that might be needed.

[ paulmck: Apply Linus Torvalds feedback. ]

Link: https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20210721202127.2129660-4-paulmck@kernel.org/
Suggested-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
Acked-by: Mathieu Desnoyers <mathieu.desnoyers@efficios.com>
Signed-off-by: Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@kernel.org>
2021-08-06 13:41:48 -07:00
arch ARM: SoC fixes for v5.14 2021-07-17 15:58:24 -07:00
block block-5.14-2021-07-08 2021-07-09 12:05:33 -07:00
certs Kbuild updates for v5.13 (2nd) 2021-05-08 10:00:11 -07:00
crypto Merge branch 'linus' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/herbert/crypto-2.6 2021-07-09 11:00:44 -07:00
Documentation Kbuild fixes for v5.14 2021-07-18 11:10:30 -07:00
drivers ARM: SoC fixes for v5.14 2021-07-17 15:58:24 -07:00
fs Fixes for 5.14-rc: 2021-07-18 11:27:25 -07:00
include rcu: Remove special bit at the bottom of the ->dynticks counter 2021-08-06 13:41:48 -07:00
init Revert "mm/slub: use stackdepot to save stack trace in objects" 2021-07-17 13:27:00 -07:00
ipc Merge branch 'akpm' (patches from Andrew) 2021-07-02 12:08:10 -07:00
kernel rcu: Weaken ->dynticks accesses and updates 2021-08-06 13:41:48 -07:00
lib lib/test_hmm: remove set but unused page variable 2021-07-15 10:13:49 -07:00
LICENSES LICENSES/dual/CC-BY-4.0: Git rid of "smart quotes" 2021-07-15 06:31:24 -06:00
mm Revert "mm/slub: use stackdepot to save stack trace in objects" 2021-07-17 13:27:00 -07:00
net Networking fixes for 5.14-rc2, including fixes from bpf and netfilter. 2021-07-14 09:24:32 -07:00
samples Networking fixes for 5.14-rc2, including fixes from bpf and netfilter. 2021-07-14 09:24:32 -07:00
scripts Kbuild fixes for v5.14 2021-07-18 11:10:30 -07:00
security asm-generic/unaligned: Unify asm/unaligned.h around struct helper 2021-07-02 12:43:40 -07:00
sound ASoC: Mediatek: MT8183: Fix fall-through warning for Clang 2021-07-13 14:58:18 -05:00
tools perf tools fixes for v5.14: 1st batch 2021-07-18 12:20:27 -07:00
usr .gitignore: prefix local generated files with a slash 2021-05-02 00:43:35 +09:00
virt * Allow again loading KVM on 32-bit non-PAE builds 2021-07-15 11:56:07 -07:00
.clang-format clang-format: Update with the latest for_each macro list 2021-05-12 23:32:39 +02:00
.cocciconfig
.get_maintainer.ignore Opt out of scripts/get_maintainer.pl 2019-05-16 10:53:40 -07:00
.gitattributes .gitattributes: use 'dts' diff driver for dts files 2019-12-04 19:44:11 -08:00
.gitignore .gitignore: ignore only top-level modules.builtin 2021-05-02 00:43:35 +09:00
.mailmap m68k updates for v5.14 2021-06-28 14:01:03 -07:00
COPYING COPYING: state that all contributions really are covered by this file 2020-02-10 13:32:20 -08:00
CREDITS MAINTAINERS: move Murali Karicheri to credits 2021-04-29 15:47:30 -07:00
Kbuild kbuild: rename hostprogs-y/always to hostprogs/always-y 2020-02-04 01:53:07 +09:00
Kconfig kbuild: ensure full rebuild when the compiler is updated 2020-05-12 13:28:33 +09:00
MAINTAINERS IOMMU Fixes for Linux v5.14-rc1 2021-07-15 11:50:15 -07:00
Makefile Linux 5.14-rc2 2021-07-18 14:13:49 -07:00
README Drop all 00-INDEX files from Documentation/ 2018-09-09 15:08:58 -06:00

Linux kernel
============

There are several guides for kernel developers and users. These guides can
be rendered in a number of formats, like HTML and PDF. Please read
Documentation/admin-guide/README.rst first.

In order to build the documentation, use ``make htmldocs`` or
``make pdfdocs``.  The formatted documentation can also be read online at:

    https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/

There are various text files in the Documentation/ subdirectory,
several of them using the Restructured Text markup notation.

Please read the Documentation/process/changes.rst file, as it contains the
requirements for building and running the kernel, and information about
the problems which may result by upgrading your kernel.