Re: [PATCH v2 0/5] Statsfs: a new ram-based file sytem for Linux kernel statistics

[Emanuele Giuseppe Esposito <eesposit@redhat.com>]

On 5/4/20 11:37 PM, David Rientjes wrote:
> On Mon, 4 May 2020, Emanuele Giuseppe Esposito wrote:
> 
>>
>> In this patch series I introduce statsfs, a synthetic ram-based virtual
>> filesystem that takes care of gathering and displaying statistics for the
>> Linux kernel subsystems.
>>
> 
> This is exciting, we have been looking in the same area recently.  Adding
> Jonathan Adams <jwadams@google.com>.
> 
> In your diffstat, one thing I notice that is omitted: an update to
> Documentation/* :)  Any chance of getting some proposed Documentation/
> updates with structure of the fs, the per subsystem breakdown, and best
> practices for managing the stats from the kernel level?

Yes, I will write some documentation. Thank you for the suggestion.

>>
>> Values represent quantites that are gathered by the statsfs user. Examples
>> of values include the number of vm exits of a given kind, the amount of
>> memory used by some data structure, the length of the longest hash table
>> chain, or anything like that. Values are defined with the
>> statsfs_source_add_values function. Each value is defined by a struct
>> statsfs_value; the same statsfs_value can be added to many different
>> sources. A value can be considered "simple" if it fetches data from a
>> user-provided location, or "aggregate" if it groups all values in the
>> subordinates sources that include the same statsfs_value.
>>
> 
> This seems like it could have a lot of overhead if we wanted to
> periodically track the totality of subsystem stats as a form of telemetry
> gathering from userspace.  To collect telemetry for 1,000 different stats,
> do we need to issue lseek()+read() syscalls for each of them individually
> (or, worse, open()+read()+close())?
> 
> Any thoughts on how that can be optimized?  A couple of ideas:
> 
>   - an interface that allows gathering of all stats for a particular
>     interface through a single file that would likely be encoded in binary
>     and the responsibility of userspace to disseminate, or
> 
>   - an interface that extends beyond this proposal and allows the reader to
>     specify which stats they are interested in collecting and then the
>     kernel will only provide these stats in a well formed structure and
>     also be binary encoded.

Are you thinking of another file, containing all the stats for the 
directory in binary format?

> We've found that the one-file-per-stat method is pretty much a show
> stopper from the performance view and we always must execute at least two
> syscalls to obtain a single stat.
> 
> Since this is becoming a generic API (good!!), maybe we can discuss
> possible ways to optimize gathering of stats in mass?

Sure, the idea of a binary format was considered from the beginning in 
[1], and it can be done either together with the current filesystem, or 
as a replacement via different mount options.

Thank you,
Emanuele

>> [1] https://lore.kernel.org/kvm/5d6cdcb1-d8ad-7ae6-7351-3544e2fa366d@redhat.com/?fbclid=IwAR18LHJ0PBcXcDaLzILFhHsl3qpT3z2vlG60RnqgbpGYhDv7L43n0ZXJY8M


>>
>> Signed-off-by: Emanuele Giuseppe Esposito <eesposit@redhat.com>
>>
>> v1->v2 remove unnecessary list_foreach_safe loops, fix wrong indentation,
>> change statsfs in stats_fs
>>
>> Emanuele Giuseppe Esposito (5):
>>    refcount, kref: add dec-and-test wrappers for rw_semaphores
>>    stats_fs API: create, add and remove stats_fs sources and values
>>    kunit: tests for stats_fs API
>>    stats_fs fs: virtual fs to show stats to the end-user
>>    kvm_main: replace debugfs with stats_fs
>>
>>   MAINTAINERS                     |    7 +
>>   arch/arm64/kvm/Kconfig          |    1 +
>>   arch/arm64/kvm/guest.c          |    2 +-
>>   arch/mips/kvm/Kconfig           |    1 +
>>   arch/mips/kvm/mips.c            |    2 +-
>>   arch/powerpc/kvm/Kconfig        |    1 +
>>   arch/powerpc/kvm/book3s.c       |    6 +-
>>   arch/powerpc/kvm/booke.c        |    8 +-
>>   arch/s390/kvm/Kconfig           |    1 +
>>   arch/s390/kvm/kvm-s390.c        |   16 +-
>>   arch/x86/include/asm/kvm_host.h |    2 +-
>>   arch/x86/kvm/Kconfig            |    1 +
>>   arch/x86/kvm/Makefile           |    2 +-
>>   arch/x86/kvm/debugfs.c          |   64 --
>>   arch/x86/kvm/stats_fs.c         |   56 ++
>>   arch/x86/kvm/x86.c              |    6 +-
>>   fs/Kconfig                      |   12 +
>>   fs/Makefile                     |    1 +
>>   fs/stats_fs/Makefile            |    6 +
>>   fs/stats_fs/inode.c             |  337 ++++++++++
>>   fs/stats_fs/internal.h          |   35 +
>>   fs/stats_fs/stats_fs-tests.c    | 1088 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>>   fs/stats_fs/stats_fs.c          |  773 ++++++++++++++++++++++
>>   include/linux/kref.h            |   11 +
>>   include/linux/kvm_host.h        |   39 +-
>>   include/linux/refcount.h        |    2 +
>>   include/linux/stats_fs.h        |  304 +++++++++
>>   include/uapi/linux/magic.h      |    1 +
>>   lib/refcount.c                  |   32 +
>>   tools/lib/api/fs/fs.c           |   21 +
>>   virt/kvm/arm/arm.c              |    2 +-
>>   virt/kvm/kvm_main.c             |  314 ++-------
>>   32 files changed, 2772 insertions(+), 382 deletions(-)
>>   delete mode 100644 arch/x86/kvm/debugfs.c
>>   create mode 100644 arch/x86/kvm/stats_fs.c
>>   create mode 100644 fs/stats_fs/Makefile
>>   create mode 100644 fs/stats_fs/inode.c
>>   create mode 100644 fs/stats_fs/internal.h
>>   create mode 100644 fs/stats_fs/stats_fs-tests.c
>>   create mode 100644 fs/stats_fs/stats_fs.c
>>   create mode 100644 include/linux/stats_fs.h
>>
>> -- 
>> 2.25.2
>>