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RE: [Xen-devel] [PATCH] Yield to VCPU hcall, spinlock yielding

To: "Ian Pratt" <m+Ian.Pratt@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: RE: [Xen-devel] [PATCH] Yield to VCPU hcall, spinlock yielding
From: Bryan S Rosenburg <rosnbrg@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 8 Jun 2005 14:40:40 -0400
Cc: ryanh@xxxxxxxxxx, xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, hohnbaum@xxxxxxxxxx, Orran Y Krieger <okrieg@xxxxxxxxxx>
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"Ian Pratt" <m+Ian.Pratt@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote on 06/08/2005 02:25:56 PM:

> > The key point is that with
> > kernel-level preemption notification, VCPUs are always in
> > kernel mode when suspended, never in user mode.  Application
> > state is always saved in Linux, not in Xen, and is available
> > to be resumed on another VCPU if Linux so chooses.
>
> In principle, but...
>
> Do you believe this is going to interact well with Linux's work stealing
> CPU migration? I haven't looked closely at the current code, but from
> Linux's scheduler's POV the de-scheduled (yielded) CPU looks like a
> perfectly healthy CPU, so there's no particular reason that another CPU
> would steal work from it (without hacking the algorithm, which I suppose
> we could do). Also, do you have to do something special in your yield
> routine to ensure that no real process is currently running on the
> yielded processor so that all processes on the run queue are available
> for stealing?
>
> Ian

In our original posting, we proposed that the Linux interrupt handler for preemption notifications would create (or unblock) a high-priority kernel thread which would then yield back to the hypervisor.  To Linux on other CPUs, the de-scheduled CPU would appear to be busy running the high-priority thread, and all real work that that CPU had been doing would be eligible for stealing.

I don't think that Ryan has yet implemented the high-priority thread part of the proposal, but that's always been part of the plan.

- Bryan
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