Re: [process scheduler] Possible bug in context_swich()?

From: Peter Zijlstra
Date: Wed Sep 08 2010 - 11:54:25 EST


On Wed, 2010-09-08 at 17:28 +0200, fabio de francesco wrote:

> In context_switch() (in linux/kernel/sched.c), starting with release 2.6.33,
> two "unlikely" macro have been changed to "likely". I think the previous
> logic was right while the latter is wrong.
>
> In case I am missing something I, please, ask someone to explain the above
> mentioned inversion of logic through releases.

It helps if you CC people, LKML alone is a bit of a gamble.

git blame kernel/sched.c, will tell you that the change you refer to
comes from:

commit 710390d90f143a9ebb87a475215140f426792efd
Author: Tim Blechmann <tim@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue Nov 24 11:55:27 2009 +0100

sched: Optimize branch hint in context_switch()

Branch hint profiling on my nehalem machine showed over 90%
incorrect branch hints:

10420275 170645395 94 context_switch sched.c
3043
10408421 171098521 94 context_switch sched.c
3050

Signed-off-by: Tim Blechmann <tim@xxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Peter Zijlstra <a.p.zijlstra@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Mike Galbraith <efault@xxxxxx>
Cc: Paul Mackerras <paulus@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo <acme@xxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Frederic Weisbecker <fweisbec@xxxxxxxxx>
LKML-Reference: <4B0BBB9F.6080304@xxxxxxxxxx>
Signed-off-by: Ingo Molnar <mingo@xxxxxxx>

diff --git a/kernel/sched.c b/kernel/sched.c
index 93474a7..010d5e1 100644
--- a/kernel/sched.c
+++ b/kernel/sched.c
@@ -2829,14 +2829,14 @@ context_switch(struct rq *rq, struct task_struct *prev,
*/
arch_start_context_switch(prev);

- if (unlikely(!mm)) {
+ if (likely(!mm)) {
next->active_mm = oldmm;
atomic_inc(&oldmm->mm_count);
enter_lazy_tlb(oldmm, next);
} else
switch_mm(oldmm, mm, next);

- if (unlikely(!prev->mm)) {
+ if (likely(!prev->mm)) {
prev->active_mm = NULL;
rq->prev_mm = oldmm;
}

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