[PATCH 2/2] Reduce qsort stack consumption

[Håkan Lindqvist]

From 512787994fa79a91230175346764efcfc9fcd833 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Hakan Lindqvist <hakan.lindqvist@enea.com>
Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2018 14:55:01 +0100
Subject: [PATCH 2/2] Reduce qsort stack consumption

Classical function call recursion wastes a lot of stack space.
Each recursion level requires a full stack frame comprising all
local variables and additional space as dictated by the
processor calling convention.

This implementation instead stores the variables that are unique
for each recursion level in a parameter stack array, and uses
iteration to emulate recursion. Function call recursion is not
used until the array is full.

To ensure the stack consumption isn't worsened by this design, the
size of the parameter stack array is chosen to be similar to the
stack frame excluding the array. Each function call recursion level
can handle 8 iterative recursion levels.

Stack consumption will worsen when sorting tiny arrays that do not
need recursion (of 6 elements or less). It will be about equal for
up to 15 elements, and be an improvement for larger arrays. The
improvement is a reduction down to about one fifth of the stack
consumption for large arrays.

A design where the parameter stack array is large enough for the
worst case recursion level was rejected because it would worsen
the stack consumption when sorting arrays smaller than about 1500
elements. The worst case is 31 levels on a 32-bit system.

A design with a dynamic parameter array size was rejected because
of limitations in some compilers.
---
 newlib/libc/search/qsort.c | 60 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-----
 1 file changed, 54 insertions(+), 6 deletions(-)

diff --git a/newlib/libc/search/qsort.c b/newlib/libc/search/qsort.c
index 4dc61be..e52c92f 100644
--- a/newlib/libc/search/qsort.c
+++ b/newlib/libc/search/qsort.c
@@ -145,6 +145,22 @@ __unused
               :(CMP(thunk, b, c) > 0 ? b : (CMP(thunk, a, c) < 0 ? a : c ));
 }
 
+/*
+ * Classical function call recursion wastes a lot of stack space. Each
+ * recursion level requires a full stack frame comprising all local variables
+ * and additional space as dictated by the processor calling convention.
+ *
+ * This implementation instead stores the variables that are unique for each
+ * recursion level in a parameter stack array, and uses iteration to emulate
+ * recursion. Function call recursion is not used until the array is full.
+ *
+ * To ensure the stack consumption isn't worsened by this design, the size of
+ * the parameter stack array is choosen to be similar to the stack frame
+ * excluding the array. Each function call recursion level can handle this
+ * number of iterative recursion levels.
+ */
+#define PARAMETER_STACK_LEVELS 8u
+
 #if defined(I_AM_QSORT_R)
 void
 __bsd_qsort_r (void *a,
@@ -172,6 +188,8 @@ qsort (void *a,
 	size_t d, r;
 	int cmp_result;
 	int swaptype, swap_cnt;
+	size_t recursion_level = 0;
+	struct { void *a; size_t n; } parameter_stack[PARAMETER_STACK_LEVELS];
 
 	SWAPINIT(a, es);
 loop:	swap_cnt = 0;
@@ -181,7 +199,7 @@ loop:	swap_cnt = 0;
 			for (pl = pm; pl > (char *) a && CMP(thunk, pl - es, pl) > 0;
 			     pl -= es)
 				swap(pl, pl - es);
-		return;
+		goto pop;
 	}
 
 	/* Select a pivot element, move it to the left. */
@@ -239,7 +257,7 @@ loop:	swap_cnt = 0;
 			for (pl = pm; pl > (char *) a && CMP(thunk, pl - es, pl) > 0;
 			     pl -= es)
 				swap(pl, pl - es);
-		return;
+		goto pop;
 	}
 
 	/*
@@ -280,18 +298,48 @@ loop:	swap_cnt = 0;
 	 * recursion depth that is bounded to be less than (log2(n)).
 	 */
 	if (r > es) {  /* Smaller part > 1 element. Both parts need sorting. */
-		/* Sort smaller part using recursion. */
+		if (recursion_level < PARAMETER_STACK_LEVELS) {
+			/*
+			 * The smaller part needs to be recursively sorted
+			 * before the larger part is sorted. To avoid function
+			 * call recursion the parameters for the larger part
+			 * are pushed on the parameter_stack array. The smaller
+			 * part is sorted using iteration and the larger part
+			 * will be sorted when the parameter_stack is "poped"
+			 * after the smaller part has been sorted.
+			 */
+			parameter_stack[recursion_level].a = a;
+			parameter_stack[recursion_level].n = n / es;
+			recursion_level++;
+			a = pa;
+			n = r / es;
+			goto loop;
+		}
+		else {
+			/*
+			 * The parameter_stack array is full. The smaller part
+			 * is sorted using function call recursion. The larger
+			 * part will be sorted after the function call returns.
+			 */
 #if defined(I_AM_QSORT_R)
-		__bsd_qsort_r(pa, r / es, es, thunk, cmp);
+			__bsd_qsort_r(pa, r / es, es, thunk, cmp);
 #elif defined(I_AM_GNU_QSORT_R)
-		qsort_r(pa, r / es, es, cmp, thunk);
+			qsort_r(pa, r / es, es, cmp, thunk);
 #else
-		qsort(pa, r / es, es, cmp);
+			qsort(pa, r / es, es, cmp);
 #endif
+		}
 	}
 	if (n > es) {  /* The larger part needs sorting. Iterate to sort.  */
 		n = n / es;
 		goto loop;
 	}
 	/* Both left and right parts are one element or less - level done. */
+pop:
+	if (recursion_level != 0) {
+		recursion_level--;
+		a = parameter_stack[recursion_level].a;
+		n = parameter_stack[recursion_level].n;
+		goto loop;
+	}
 }
-- 
1.8.5