Re: [PATCH v12 09/11] x86/tsc: prepare for early sched_clock

[Pavel Tatashin <pasha.tatashin@oracle.com>]

> So you forgot to answer this question. I did not find a system yet, which
> actually exposes this behaviour on mainline.
>
> Is this an artifact of your early sched clock thing?
>

Yes, it is. Let me explain how it happens.

So, the problem is introduced in patch "sched: early boot clock" by this change:

-       if (unlikely(!sched_clock_running))
-               return 0ull;
+       /* Use early clock until sched_clock_init_late() */
+       if (unlikely(sched_clock_running < 2))
+               return sched_clock() + __sched_clock_offset;

As soon as sched_clock() starts output non-zero values, we start
output time without correcting the output as it is done in
sched_clock_local() where unstable TSC and backward motion are
detected. But, since early in boot interrupts are disabled, we cannot
really correct invalid time, and therefore must rely on sched_clock()
to provide us with a contiguous and sane time. In earlier versions of
this project, I was solving this problem by adjusting
__sched_clock_offset every time sched_clock()'s continuity was changed
by using a callback function into sched/clock.c. But, Peter was
against that approach.