Re: [patch 1/13] Qsort

[Matt Mackall]

On Sun, Jan 23, 2005 at 03:39:34AM +0100, Andi Kleen wrote:
> Felipe Alfaro Solana <lkml@xxxxxxx> writes:
> >
> > AFAIK, XOR is quite expensive on IA32 when compared to simple MOV
> > operatings. Also, since the original patch uses 3 MOVs to perform the
> > swapping, and your version uses 3 XOR operations, I don't see any
> > gains.
> 
> Both are one cycle latency for register<->register on all x86 cores
> I've looked at. What makes you think differently?
> 
> -Andi (who thinks the glibc qsort is vast overkill for kernel purposes
> where there are only small data sets and it would be better to use a 
> simpler one optimized for code size)

Mostly agreed. Except:

a) the glibc version is not actually all that optimized
b) it's nice that it's not recursive
c) the three-way median selection does help avoid worst-case O(n^2)
behavior, which might potentially be triggerable by users in places
like XFS where this is used

I'll probably whip up a simpler version tomorrow or Monday and do some
size/space benchmarking. I've been meaning to contribute a qsort for
doubly-linked lists I've got lying around as well.

-- 
Mathematics is the supreme nostalgia of our time.
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