[v2,rcu,08/16] percpu-refcount: Use call_rcu_flush() for atomic switch

Commit Message

Paul E. McKenney Nov. 22, 2022, 1:04 a.m. UTC

From: "Joel Fernandes (Google)" <[e-mail]>

Earlier commits in this series allow battery-powered systems to build
their kernels with the default-disabled CONFIG_RCU_LAZY=y Kconfig option.
This Kconfig option causes call_rcu() to delay its callbacks in order to
batch callbacks.  This means that a given RCU grace period covers more
callbacks, thus reducing the number of grace periods, in turn reducing
the amount of energy consumed, which increases battery lifetime which
can be a very good thing.  This is not a subtle effect: In some important
use cases, the battery lifetime is increased by more than 10%.

This CONFIG_RCU_LAZY=y option is available only for CPUs that offload
callbacks, for example, CPUs mentioned in the rcu_nocbs kernel boot
parameter passed to kernels built with CONFIG_RCU_NOCB_CPU=y.

Delaying callbacks is normally not a problem because most callbacks do
nothing but free memory.  If the system is short on memory, a shrinker
will kick all currently queued lazy callbacks out of their laziness,
thus freeing their memory in short order.  Similarly, the rcu_barrier()
function, which blocks until all currently queued callbacks are invoked,
will also kick lazy callbacks, thus enabling rcu_barrier() to complete
in a timely manner.

However, there are some cases where laziness is not a good option.
For example, synchronize_rcu() invokes call_rcu(), and blocks until
the newly queued callback is invoked.  It would not be a good for
synchronize_rcu() to block for ten seconds, even on an idle system.
Therefore, synchronize_rcu() invokes call_rcu_flush() instead of
call_rcu().  The arrival of a non-lazy call_rcu_flush() callback on a
given CPU kicks any lazy callbacks that might be already queued on that
CPU.  After all, if there is going to be a grace period, all callbacks
might as well get full benefit from it.

Yes, this could be done the other way around by creating a
call_rcu_lazy(), but earlier experience with this approach and
feedback at the 2022 Linux Plumbers Conference shifted the approach
to call_rcu() being lazy with call_rcu_flush() for the few places
where laziness is inappropriate.

And another call_rcu() instance that cannot be lazy is the one on the
percpu refcounter's "per-CPU to atomic switch" code path, which
uses RCU when switching to atomic mode.  The enqueued callback
wakes up waiters waiting in the percpu_ref_switch_waitq.  Allowing
this callback to be lazy would result in unacceptable slowdowns for
users of per-CPU refcounts, such as blk_pre_runtime_suspend().

Therefore, make __percpu_ref_switch_to_atomic() use call_rcu_flush()
in order to revert to the old behavior.

Signed-off-by: Joel Fernandes (Google) <[e-mail]>
Signed-off-by: Paul E. McKenney <[e-mail]>
Cc: Dennis Zhou <[e-mail]>
Cc: Tejun Heo <[e-mail]>
Cc: Christoph Lameter <[e-mail]>
Cc: <[e-mail]>
---
 lib/percpu-refcount.c | 3 ++-
 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

Patch

diff --git a/lib/percpu-refcount.c b/lib/percpu-refcount.c
index e5c5315da2741..65c58a029297d 100644
--- a/lib/percpu-refcount.c
+++ b/lib/percpu-refcount.c
@@ -230,7 +230,8 @@  static void __percpu_ref_switch_to_atomic(struct percpu_ref *ref,
 		percpu_ref_noop_confirm_switch;
 
 	percpu_ref_get(ref);	/* put after confirmation */
-	call_rcu(&ref->data->rcu, percpu_ref_switch_to_atomic_rcu);
+	call_rcu_flush(&ref->data->rcu,
+		       percpu_ref_switch_to_atomic_rcu);
 }
 
 static void __percpu_ref_switch_to_percpu(struct percpu_ref *ref)