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Re: [PATCH] hppa: Optimize atomic_compare_and_exchange_val_acq
- From: Carlos O'Donell <carlos at redhat dot com>
- To: John David Anglin <dave dot anglin at bell dot net>, GNU C Library <libc-alpha at sourceware dot org>
- Cc: deller at kernel dot org, Mike Frysinger <vapier at gentoo dot org>, Aurelien Jarno <aurelien at aurel32 dot net>
- Date: Thu, 22 Sep 2016 16:37:21 -0400
- Subject: Re: [PATCH] hppa: Optimize atomic_compare_and_exchange_val_acq
- Authentication-results: sourceware.org; auth=none
- References: <58B70052-B987-4C41-B603-F3AAB2FDE34B@bell.net>
On 09/22/2016 10:14 AM, John David Anglin wrote:
> The attached patch replaces the conditional branch tests in
> atomic_compare_and_exchange_val_acq with conditional instruction
> nullification. This avoids the stalls associated with conditional
> branches and the resulting code is shorter. There are no branches in
> the fast path when the operation is successful.
Does this really make a measurable difference? The light-weight-syscall
is probably the most costly part of this entire operation.
If you can show there is a measurable difference I would be willing
to accept the removal of the deadlock looping (it becomes a SIGILL
and you have to look at the core file).
> The change was intended as an optimization but tst-stack4 now passes.
This is a red flag for this patch.
Any idea what changes?
The tst-stack4 test creates a bunch of threads, that all create their
own stacks, release them (placing them on the free stack list) and then
they get reused by new threads, all during dlopen/dlsym operation which
is growing the DTV. We try to catch a case where the DTV size is too small
and we overflow. I don't see how that could be related to what you have here?
> 2016-09-22 John David Anglin
>
> * sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/hppa/atomic-machine.h: Don't include
> abort-instr.h.
> (EFAULT): Remove conditional define.
> (ENOSYS): Likewise.
> (atomic_compare_and_exchange_val_acq): Use instruction nullification
> instead of conditional branch instructions.
--
Cheers,
Carlos.