Re: [RFC 1/8] sched: Add nice value change notifier

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On 06/10/2021 21:21, Barry Song wrote:
On Thu, Oct 7, 2021 at 2:44 AM Tvrtko Ursulin
<tvrtko.ursulin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


Hi,

On 06/10/2021 08:58, Barry Song wrote:
On Wed, Oct 6, 2021 at 5:15 PM Wanghui (John) <john.wanghui@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

HI Tvrtko

On 2021/10/4 22:36, Tvrtko Ursulin wrote:
    void set_user_nice(struct task_struct *p, long nice)
    {
        bool queued, running;
-     int old_prio;
+     int old_prio, ret;
        struct rq_flags rf;
        struct rq *rq;

@@ -6915,6 +6947,9 @@ void set_user_nice(struct task_struct *p, long nice)

    out_unlock:
        task_rq_unlock(rq, p, &rf);
+
+     ret = atomic_notifier_call_chain(&user_nice_notifier_list, nice, p);
+     WARN_ON_ONCE(ret != NOTIFY_DONE);
    }
How about adding a new "io_nice" to task_struct,and move the call chain to
sched_setattr/getattr, there are two benefits:

We already have an ionice for block io scheduler. hardly can this new io_nice
be generic to all I/O. it seems the patchset is trying to link
process' nice with
GPU's scheduler, to some extent, it makes more senses than having a
common ionice because we have a lot of IO devices in the systems, we don't
know which I/O the ionice of task_struct should be applied to.

Maybe we could have an ionice dedicated for GPU just like ionice for CFQ
of bio/request scheduler.

Thought crossed my mind but I couldn't see the practicality of a 3rd
nice concept. I mean even to start with I struggle a bit with the
usefulness of existing ionice vs nice. Like coming up with practical
examples of usecases where it makes sense to decouple the two priorities.

  From a different angle I did think inheriting CPU nice makes sense for
GPU workloads. This is because today, and more so in the future,
computations on a same data set do flow from one to the other.

Like maybe a simple example of batch image processing where CPU decodes,
GPU does a transform and then CPU encodes. Or a different mix, doesn't
really matter, since the main point it is one computing pipeline from
users point of view.


I am on it. but I am also seeing two problems here:
1. nice is not global in linux. For example, if you have two cgroups, cgroup A
has more quota then cgroup B. Tasks in B won't win even if it has a lower nice.
cgroups will run proportional-weight time-based division of CPU.

2. Historically, we had dynamic nice which was adjusted based on the average
sleep/running time; right now, we don't have dynamic nice, but virtual time
still make tasks which sleep more preempt other tasks with the same nice
or even lower nice.
virtual time += physical time/weight by nice
so, static nice number doesn't always make sense to decide preemption.

So it seems your patch only works under some simple situation for example
no cgroups, tasks have similar sleep/running time.

Yes, I broadly agree with your assessment. Although there are plans for adding cgroup support to i915 scheduling, I doubt as fine grained control and exact semantics as there are on the CPU side will happen.

Mostly because the drive seems to be for more micro-controller managed scheduling which adds further challenges in connecting the two sides together.

But when you say it is a problem, I would characterize it more a weakness in terms of being only a subset of possible control. It is still richer (better?) than what currently exists and as demonstrated with benchmarks in my cover letter it can deliver improvements in user experience. If in the mid term future we can extend it with cgroup support then the concept should still apply and get closer to how you described nice works in the CPU world.

Main question in my mind is whether the idea of adding the sched_attr/priority notifier to the kernel can be justified. Because as mentioned before, everything apart from adjusting currently running GPU jobs could be done purely in userspace. Stack changes would be quite extensive and all, but that is not usually a good enough reason to put something in the kernel. That's why it is an RFC an invitation to discuss.

Even ionice inherits from nice (see task_nice_ioprio()) so I think argument can be made for drivers as well.

Regards,

Tvrtko

In this example perhaps everything could be handled in userspace so
that's another argument to be had. Userspace could query the current
scheduling attributes before submitting work to the processing pipeline
and adjust using respective uapi.

Downside would be inability to react to changes after the work is
already running which may not be too serious limitation outside the
world of multi-minute compute workloads. And latter are probably special
case enough that would be configured explicitly.


1. Decoupled with fair scheduelr. In our use case, high priority tasks often
      use rt scheduler.

Is it possible to tell GPU RT as we are telling them CFS nice?

Yes of course. We could create a common notification "data packet" which
would be sent from both entry points and provide more data than just the
nice value. Consumers (of the notifier chain) could then decide for
themselves what they want to do with the data.

RT should have the same problem with CFS once we have cgroups.


Regards,

Tvrtko


2. The range of value don't need to be bound to -20~19 or 0~139


could build a mapping between the priorities of process and GPU. It seems
not a big deal.

Thanks
barry


Thanks
barry




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