On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 9:15 PM Burakov, Anatoly
<anatoly.bura...@intel.com> wrote:
>
> On 15-Jun-20 4:21 PM, Jerin Jacob wrote:
> > On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 8:35 PM Burakov, Anatoly
> > <anatoly.bura...@intel.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> On 15-Jun-20 12:43 PM, Jerin Jacob wrote:
> >>> On Mon, Jun 15, 2020 at 5:02 PM Burakov, Anatoly
> >>> <anatoly.bura...@intel.com> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> On 02-Jun-20 1:16 PM, Harman Kalra wrote:
> >>>>> On Tue, Jun 02, 2020 at 03:53:07PM +0530, Harman Kalra wrote:
> >>>>>> On Mon, Jun 01, 2020 at 01:50:26PM +0100, Burakov, Anatoly wrote:
> >>>>>>> On 30-May-20 11:02 AM, Harman Kalra wrote:
> >>>>>>>> On Fri, May 29, 2020 at 03:19:45PM +0100, Burakov, Anatoly wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> External Email
> >>>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>>>>>>>> On 29-May-20 2:19 PM, Harman Kalra wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>>>> if (ret < 0)
> >>>>>>>>>>> rte_exit(EXIT_FAILURE, "Invalid L3FWD
> >>>>>>>>>>> parameters\n");
> >>>>>>>>>>> - if (app_mode != APP_MODE_TELEMETRY &&
> >>>>>>>>>>> init_power_library())
> >>>>>>>>>>> + if (app_mode == APP_MODE_DEFAULT)
> >>>>>>>>>>> + app_mode = APP_MODE_LEGACY;
> >>>>>>>>>>> +
> >>>>>>>>>>> + /* only legacy and empty poll mode rely on power library
> >>>>>>>>>>> */
> >>>>>>>>>>> + if ((app_mode == APP_MODE_LEGACY || app_mode ==
> >>>>>>>>>>> APP_MODE_EMPTY_POLL) &&
> >>>>>>>>>>> + init_power_library())
> >>>>>>>>>>> rte_exit(EXIT_FAILURE, "init_power_library
> >>>>>>>>>>> failed\n");
> >>>>>>>>>> Hi,
> >>>>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>>> Rather than just exiting from here can we have a else condition to
> >>>>>>>>>> automatically enter into the "interrupt only" mode.
> >>>>>>>>>> Please correct me if I am missing something.
> >>>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>> Hi,
> >>>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>> Thanks for your review. I don't think silently proceeding is a good
> >>>>>>>>> idea. If
> >>>>>>>>> the user wants interrupt-only mode, they should request it.
> >>>>>>>>> Silently falling
> >>>>>>>>> back to interrupt-only mode will create an illusion of successful
> >>>>>>>>> initialization and set the wrong expectation for how the
> >>>>>>>>> application will
> >>>>>>>>> behave.
> >>>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Hi,
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Thanks for the explanation which even I also believe is logically
> >>>>>>>> perfect.
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> But since l3fwd-power is an old application and has many users around
> >>>>>>>> which are currently using this app in interrupt only mode without
> >>>>>>>> giving
> >>>>>>>> an extra argument. But suddenly they will start getting failure
> >>>>>>>> messages with
> >>>>>>>> the new patchset.
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> My only intent with else condition was backward compatibility.
> >>>>>>>> Or may be we can have more descriptive failure message, something
> >>>>>>>> like
> >>>>>>>> "init_power_library failed, check manual for other modes".
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>> Thanks
> >>>>>>>> Harman
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> I think we can compormise on an informative log message suggesting to
> >>>>>>> use
> >>>>>>> interrupt mode. I'm not keen on reverting to previous buggy behavior
> >>>>>>> :)
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>> Hi
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> I am not insisting to revert to previous behavior, I am just trying to
> >>>>>> highlight some probable issues that many users might face as its an old
> >>>>>> application.
> >>>>>> Since many arm based soc might not be supporting frequency scaling, can
> >>>>>> we add the following check as soon as the application starts, probe the
> >>>>>> platform if it supports frequency scaling, if not automatically set the
> >>>>>> mode to interrupt mode, something like:
> >>>>>> if (access("/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor",
> >>>>>> F_OK))
> >>>>>> app_mode = APP_MODE_INTERRUPT;
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Sorry, no direct check in application but we can introduce a new API in
> >>>>> power library:
> >>>>> bool rte_is_freq_scaling() {
> >>>>> return
> >>>>> access("/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor",
> >>>>> F_OK);
> >>>>> }
> >>>>>
> >>>>> and in the application we can use "rte_is_freq_scaling()" at the start.
> >>>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> What you're suggesting here is effectively what you have already
> >>>> suggested: silently fall back to interrupt-only mode if power lib init
> >>>> failed. I already outlined why i don't think it's a good approach.
> >>>
> >>> Is probing "/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor"
> >>> file presence,
> >>> detects the power lib availability . Right? Not the failure. Right?
> >>> IMO, it make sense to have following case:
> >>> # first check, Is the system is capable of power lib if so use power lib
> >>> # if the system is not capable of using power lib use interrupt mode.
> >>>
> >>> I think, there is difference between system capable of using power lib
> >>> vs power lib not available or power lib failure.
> >>
> >> I am of the opinion that if a test sets up an unrealistic expectation of
> >> how an application should behave, it's a problem with the test, not with
> >> the application.
> >>
> >> If the system is not capable of running with power lib - the application
> >> shouldn't be requested to run in such mode.
> >
> > But with this patch, default proposed mode is power lib without any
> > explicit request.
>
> The default has always been "use the power library". That was always the
> expected behavior, i believe since the very first version of this
> application. In other words, even if the "requested" behavior is not
> requested explicitly, it has always been that implicitly, and this patch
> is *keeping existing behavior*.
See below,
>
> >
> >>
> >> "The application behaved that way before" - yes, it did. It was a bug in
> >> the application, that it allowed users to effectively misuse the
> >> application and use it despite the fact that it was in a half-working
> >> state. This problem has been addressed by 1) not allowing the
> >> application to run in half-working state, and 2) adding a new mode where
> >> the old "expected" behavior is *actually* expected and is "full working
> >> state" now.
> >>
> >> Therefore, all users who were previously misusing the application to do
> >> something it was not designed to do because of a bug in the
> >> implementation, should now fix their usage and use the correct mode -
> >> and such breakage is IMO necessary to call attention to earlier misuse
> >> in the tools, and to correct this usage.
> >>
> >> What bothers me about your suggestion is that it is impossible to fail
> >> the test if the wrong mode was requested (as in, if we request the
> >> power-lib mode on a system that doesn't have freq scaling) - it instead
> >> silently falls back to a mode that is almost guaranteed to work.
> >
> > I agree that it should fail, i.e someone explicitly request,
> > power-lib mode or any mode
> > and it should fail application if the platform we can not do that.
> >
> > My suggestion is all about, what is the default, IMO, if no argument
> > is specified,
> > the application should _probe_ the capability of the platfrom and
> > choose the mode. One can override
> > the probe to select the desired one. In such mode, fail to configure
> > the mode should result in
> > an error.
>
> This would change the default behavior that has always existed with this
> application, and would still be subject to silent failure issue
> *because* older tests may not account for this implied assumption of
> "the application will run no matter what", leading to a possible false
> positive test result.
>
> Now, if the default was "not to run and ask explicitly what mode should
> the user use" - i can see how we could both agree on that. It's not
> unprecedented - l3fwd itself won't run unless you explicitly specify
> core config, so we *could* request additional parameters by default. I
> would've also agreed with the "probe" thing *if it was a new application
> without any pre-existing usages* - but it isn't, and in this case IMO
> this is doubly important because there may be tests out there that *rely
> on a bug* and thus should be explicitly broken and addressed (like the
> internal test we had that uncovered the issue in the first place).
>
> In other words, in the perfect world, i would agree with you :) As it
> stands though, i think that intentionally breaking tests that are
> themselves broken and rely on wrong assumptions is more important than
> keeping them working.
OK. Let's enumerate the pros and cons of both approaches?
Approach a: Auto probe
Approach b: Current patch
Approach a:
+ Application picks up the mode based on platform capability
+ No change in behavior wrt existing l3fwd-power where the platform
has only interrupt support.
(otherwise, It will fail to boot up, the CI etc we need to patch based
on the DPDK version)
I am not sure approach b has pros wrt approach a.
I.e On the x86 platform where freq scaling is present then SHOULD NOT
have any difference in the approach a vs
approach b. ie. Auto probe finds the system is capable of freq scaling
and picks the powerlib. its is win-win case,
I am not sure, What I am missing?
>
> --
> Thanks,
> Anatoly
