On Thu, Oct 03, 2024 at 11:39:54PM GMT, Beata Michalska wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 26, 2024 at 04:21:14PM -0700, Vanshidhar Konda wrote:
> > On Thu, Sep 26, 2024 at 12:34:01PM GMT, Beata Michalska wrote:
> > > On Tue, Sep 17, 2024 at 05:41:09PM +0530, Sumit Gupta wrote:
> > > > Hi Beata,
> > > Hi Sumit,
> > > >
> > > > Thank you for the patches.
> > > Thank you for having a look at those.
> > > >
> > > > On 13/09/24 18:59, Beata Michalska wrote:
> > > > > External email: Use caution opening links or attachments
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > With the Frequency Invariance Engine (FIE) being already
wired up with
> > > > > sched tick and making use of relevant (core counter and
constant
> > > > > counter) AMU counters, getting the average frequency for a
given CPU,
> > > > > can be achieved by utilizing the frequency scale factor
which reflects
> > > > > an average CPU frequency for the last tick period length.
> > > > >
> > > > > The solution is partially based on APERF/MPERF
implementation of
> > > > > arch_freq_get_on_cpu.
> > > > >
> > > > > Suggested-by: Ionela Voinescu <ionela.voinescu@xxxxxxx>
> > > > > Signed-off-by: Beata Michalska <beata.michalska@xxxxxxx>
> > > > > ---
> > > > > arch/arm64/kernel/topology.c | 109
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++----
> > > > > 1 file changed, 99 insertions(+), 10 deletions(-)
> > > > >
--- snip ----
> > > >
> > > > ..
> > > > freq_comput:
> > > > scale = arch_scale_freq_capacity(cpu);
> > > > freq = scale * arch_scale_freq_ref(cpu);
> > > > ----
> > > >
> > > This boils down to the question what that function, and the
information it
> > > provides, represent really. The 'unknown' here simply says the
CPU has been idle
> > > for a while and as such the frequency data is a bit stale and
it does not
> > > represent the average freq the CPU is actually running at
anymore, which is
> > > the intention here really. Or, that the given CPU is a
non-housekeeping one.
> > > Either way I believe this is a useful information, instead of
providing
> > > stale data with no indication on whether the frequency is
really the 'current'
> > > one or not.
> > >
> > > If that is somehow undesirable we can discuss this further,
though I'd rather
> > > avoid exposing an interface where the feedback provided is open to
> > > interpretation at all times.
> >
> > Would it make sense to identify that the frequency reporting is
unknown due to
> > cpu being idle vs some other issue like being a non-housekeeping
CPU? Would
> > returning a value of 0 make it easier for tools to represent that
the CPU is
> > currently idle?
> That is an option.
> Another one would be to return an error for those cases. This would
make it
> easier to distinguish between valid frequency &/| idle CPU vs
tickless CPU
> (EINVAL vs ENOENT) ?
>
That seems like a good idea but I suspect it would be confusing to
the end user.
If a user runs `cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu2/cpuinfo_avg_freq`
they would
get an error in some cases or get a number in some other iterations.