On Fri, May 06, 2022 at 09:33:41AM -0700, Stephen Hemminger wrote:
> On Fri, 6 May 2022 16:28:41 +0100
> Bruce Richardson <bruce.richard...@intel.com> wrote:
> 
> > On Fri, May 06, 2022 at 03:12:32PM +0000, Honnappa Nagarahalli wrote:
> > > <snip>  
> > > > 
> > > > On Thu, May 05, 2022 at 10:59:32PM +0000, Honnappa Nagarahalli wrote:  
> > > > > Thanks Stephen. Do you see any performance difference with this 
> > > > > change?  
> > > > 
> > > > as a matter of due diligence i think a comparison should be made just 
> > > > to be
> > > > confident nothing is regressing.
> > > > 
> > > > i support this change in principal since it is generally accepted best 
> > > > practice to
> > > > not force inlining since it can remove more valuable optimizations that 
> > > > the
> > > > compiler may make that the human can't see.
> > > > the optimizations may vary depending on compiler implementation.
> > > > 
> > > > force inlining should be used as a targeted measure rather than blanket 
> > > > on
> > > > every function and when in use probably needs to be periodically 
> > > > reviewed and
> > > > potentially removed as the code / compiler evolves.
> > > > 
> > > > also one other consideration is the impact of a particular compiler's 
> > > > force
> > > > inlining intrinsic/builtin is that it may permit inlining of functions 
> > > > when not
> > > > declared in a header. i.e. a function from one library may be able to 
> > > > be inlined
> > > > to another binary as a link time optimization. although everything here 
> > > > is in a
> > > > header so it's a bit moot.
> > > > 
> > > > i'd like to see this change go in if possible.  
> > > Like Stephen mentions below, I am sure we will have a for and against 
> > > discussion here.
> > > As a DPDK community we have put performance front and center, I would 
> > > prefer to go down that route first.
> > >  
> > 
> > I ran some initial numbers with this patch, and the very quick summary of
> > what I've seen so far:
> > 
> > * Unit tests show no major differences, and while it depends on what
> >   specific number you are interested in, most seem within margin of error.
> > * Within unit tests, the one number I mostly look at when considering
> >   inlining is the "empty poll" cost, since I believe we should look to keep
> >   that as close to zero as possible. In the past I've seen that number jump
> >   from 3 cycles to 12 cycles due to missed inlining. In this case, it seem
> >   fine.
> > * Ran a quick test with the eventdev_pipeline example app using SW eventdev,
> >   as a test of an actual app which is fairly ring-heavy [used 8 workers
> >   with 1000 cycles per packet hop]. (Thanks to Harry vH for this suggestion
> >   of a workload)
> >   * GCC 8 build - no difference observed
> >   * GCC 11 build - approx 2% perf reduction observed
> > 
> > As I said, these are just some quick rough numbers, and I'll try and get
> > some more numbers on a couple of different platforms, see if the small
> > reduction seen is consistent or not. I may also test a few differnet
> > combinations/options in the eventdev test.  It would be good if others also
> > tested on a few platforms available to them.
> > 
> > /Bruce
> 
> I wonder if a mixed approach might help where some key bits were marked
> as more important to inline? Or setting compiler flags in build infra?

Yep, could be a number of options.

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