[PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Denis Cheng]

From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>

the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.

and C standard guaranteed all the unspecified data field initialized to zero.

Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>

---
After comments in the former threads:
http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/119
http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/48

On 6/18/07, Jan Engelhardt <jengelh@computergmbh.de> wrote:
> The cost is the same. "= {0}" is transformed into a bunch of movs,
> or a rep mov, (At least for x86), so is equivalent to memset (which
> will get transformed to __builtin_memset anyway). So I wonder
> what this really buys.
> 
> And, you do not even need the zero. Just write
>         ...[MAX_NR_ZONES] = {};

>         Jan
I also think this style of zero initialization would be better.
so the patch is little different:

--- arch/x86_64/mm/init.c.orig	2007-06-07 10:08:04.000000000 +0800
+++ arch/x86_64/mm/init.c	2007-06-23 13:12:26.000000000 +0800
@@ -406,8 +406,8 @@ void __cpuinit zap_low_mappings(int cpu)
 #ifndef CONFIG_NUMA
 void __init paging_init(void)
 {
-	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES];
-	memset(max_zone_pfns, 0, sizeof(max_zone_pfns));
+	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES] = {};
+
 	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_DMA] = MAX_DMA_PFN;
 	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_DMA32] = MAX_DMA32_PFN;
 	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_NORMAL] = end_pfn;

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Oleg Verych]

* From: Denis Cheng
* Newsgroups: linux.kernel
* Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2007 22:15:49 -0700 (PDT)
 
> From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>
> the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.

Can be optimized and can be done by compiler are just words;

> and C standard guaranteed all the unspecified data field initialized to zero.

standards and implementation are on opposite poles of magnet

> Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>
> ---
> After comments in the former threads:
> http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/119

i see a patch

> http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/48

same patch.

> @@ -406,8 +406,8 @@ void __cpuinit zap_low_mappings(int cpu)
>  #ifndef CONFIG_NUMA
>  void __init paging_init(void)
>  {
> -	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES];
> -	memset(max_zone_pfns, 0, sizeof(max_zone_pfns));
> +	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES] = {};
> +
>  	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_DMA] = MAX_DMA_PFN;
>  	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_DMA32] = MAX_DMA32_PFN;
>  	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_NORMAL] = end_pfn;

Why not just show actual objdump output on code (maybe with different
oxygen atoms used in gcc), rather than *talking* about optimization and
standards, hm?

I bet, that will be a key for success. And if you are interested in such
optimizations, why not to grep whole source tree for this kind of
things? I'm not sure one function in arch/x86_64 is only such ``unoptimized''.
And after doing that maybe you will see, that "{}" initializer can be
applied not only to integer values (you did init with of *long int*,
with *int*, btw), but to structs and others.

Ahh, one more thing about _optimizing_ your time, i.e. not wasting one.

Add to CC list people, who already did reply on you patch. Otherwise
you are showing your disrespect for them and hiding from further
discussion.

I think you do not, but Linux development not have an automatic system
for patch tracking, so you are on your own with your text editor and
e-mail client on this. Please take care for your time.

--
  frenzy
-o--=O`C
 #oo'L O
<___=E M

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Adrian Bunk]

On Sat, Jun 23, 2007 at 09:59:33AM +0200, Oleg Verych wrote:
> * From: Denis Cheng
> * Newsgroups: linux.kernel
> * Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2007 22:15:49 -0700 (PDT)
>  
> > From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> >
> > the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> > thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
> 
> Can be optimized and can be done by compiler are just words;
> 
> > and C standard guaranteed all the unspecified data field initialized to zero.
> 
> standards and implementation are on opposite poles of magnet

Bullshit.

We expect a C compiler, and if a C compiler violates the C standard 
that's a bug in the compiler that has to be fixed.

And gcc is usually quite good in following the C standard.

> > Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> >
> > ---
> > After comments in the former threads:
> > http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/119
> 
> i see a patch
> 
> > http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/48
> 
> same patch.
>...

Open your eyes and you'll find thread overviews at the left side of 
the URLs he gave...

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Oleg Verych]

On Sat, Jun 23, 2007 at 03:13:55PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 23, 2007 at 09:59:33AM +0200, Oleg Verych wrote:
[]
> > > From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> > >
> > > the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> > > thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
> > 
> > Can be optimized and can be done by compiler are just words;
> > 
> > > and C standard guaranteed all the unspecified data field initialized to zero.
> > 
> > standards and implementation are on opposite poles of magnet
> 
> Bullshit.
> 
> We expect a C compiler, and if a C compiler violates the C standard 
> that's a bug in the compiler that has to be fixed.

If you are serious, please consider last kernel headers vs ANSI C
discussion, then GNU extensions of the GCC C compiler and relevant "if
ICC doesn't support GCC extensions it's ICC's bug". That was about
implementation. About standards you are not serious, aren't you?
(Please don't see this as for this particular case, but as general
viewpoint)

> And gcc is usually quite good in following the C standard.

> > > Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> > >
> > > ---
> > > After comments in the former threads:
> > > http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/119
> > 
> > i see a patch
> > 
> > > http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/48
> > 
> > same patch.
> >...
> 
> Open your eyes and you'll find thread overviews at the left side of 
> the URLs he gave...

Two threads with *different* URLs but with *same* patch...
> 
> cu
> Adrian

Where's constructive context and support of yet another patch author,
Adrian?

> -- 
> 
>        "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
>         of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
>        "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
>                                        Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed
> 
____

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Adrian Bunk]

On Sat, Jun 23, 2007 at 03:41:26PM +0200, Oleg Verych wrote:
> On Sat, Jun 23, 2007 at 03:13:55PM +0200, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> > On Sat, Jun 23, 2007 at 09:59:33AM +0200, Oleg Verych wrote:
> []
> > > > From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> > > >
> > > > the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> > > > thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
> > > 
> > > Can be optimized and can be done by compiler are just words;
> > > 
> > > > and C standard guaranteed all the unspecified data field initialized to zero.
> > > 
> > > standards and implementation are on opposite poles of magnet
> > 
> > Bullshit.
> > 
> > We expect a C compiler, and if a C compiler violates the C standard 
> > that's a bug in the compiler that has to be fixed.
> 
> If you are serious, please consider last kernel headers vs ANSI C
> discussion,

If only Joerg would tell us where the problem exactly is...

There might be a bug in the kernel header, but this simply has to be 
fixed.

> then GNU extensions of the GCC C compiler and relevant "if
> ICC doesn't support GCC extensions it's ICC's bug".

gcc is a C compiler and claims to follow the C standard.
The kernel does not claim to be compilable by a plain C compiler.

Spot the difference?

> That was about
> implementation. About standards you are not serious, aren't you?
> (Please don't see this as for this particular case, but as general
> viewpoint)

And as with many generalizations, that's often wrong...

> > And gcc is usually quite good in following the C standard.
> 
> > > > Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> > > >
> > > > ---
> > > > After comments in the former threads:
> > > > http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/119
> > > 
> > > i see a patch
> > > 
> > > > http://lkml.org/lkml/2007/6/18/48
> > > 
> > > same patch.
> > >...
> > 
> > Open your eyes and you'll find thread overviews at the left side of 
> > the URLs he gave...
> 
> Two threads with *different* URLs but with *same* patch...
>...

The comments are in the _threads_.
The patches are only the roots of the threads.

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Segher Boessenkool]

> gcc is a C compiler and claims to follow the C standard.

Not with the options the kernel build uses.  But, close
enough -- the differences are really minor stuff.


Segher

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[rae l]

On 6/23/07, Oleg Verych <olecom@flower.upol.cz> wrote:
> Why not just show actual objdump output on code (maybe with different
> oxygen atoms used in gcc), rather than *talking* about optimization and
> standards, hm?
here is the objdump output of the two object files:
As you could see, the older one used 0x38 bytes stack space while the
new one used 0x28 bytes,
and the object code is two bytes less,
I think all these benefits are the gcc's __builtin_memset optimization
than the explicit call to memset.

$ objdump -d /tmp/init.orig.o|grep -A23 -nw '<paging_init>'
525:0000000000000395 <paging_init>:
526- 395:       48 83 ec 38             sub    $0x38,%rsp
527- 399:       48 8d 54 24 10          lea    0x10(%rsp),%rdx
528- 39e:       fc                      cld
529- 39f:       31 c0                   xor    %eax,%eax
530- 3a1:       48 89 d7                mov    %rdx,%rdi
531- 3a4:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
532- 3a5:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
533- 3a6:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
534- 3a7:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
535- 3a8:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
536- 3a9:       48 89 7c 24 08          mov    %rdi,0x8(%rsp)
537- 3ae:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
538- 3af:       48 c7 44 24 10 00 10    movq   $0x1000,0x10(%rsp)
539- 3b6:       00 00
540- 3b8:       48 c7 44 24 18 00 00    movq   $0x100000,0x18(%rsp)
541- 3bf:       10 00
542- 3c1:       48 8b 05 00 00 00 00    mov    0(%rip),%rax        #
3c8 <paging_init+0x33>
543- 3c8:       48 89 44 24 20          mov    %rax,0x20(%rsp)
544- 3cd:       48 89 d7                mov    %rdx,%rdi
545- 3d0:       e8 00 00 00 00          callq  3d5 <paging_init+0x40>
546- 3d5:       48 83 c4 38             add    $0x38,%rsp
547- 3d9:       c3                      retq
548-
$ objdump -d /tmp/init.new.o|grep -A23 -nw '<paging_init>'
525:0000000000000395 <paging_init>:
526- 395:       48 83 ec 28             sub    $0x28,%rsp
527- 399:       48 89 e7                mov    %rsp,%rdi
528- 39c:       fc                      cld
529- 39d:       31 c0                   xor    %eax,%eax
530- 39f:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
531- 3a0:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
532- 3a1:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
533- 3a2:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
534- 3a3:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
535- 3a4:       ab                      stos   %eax,%es:(%rdi)
536- 3a5:       48 c7 04 24 00 10 00    movq   $0x1000,(%rsp)
537- 3ac:       00
538- 3ad:       48 c7 44 24 08 00 00    movq   $0x100000,0x8(%rsp)
539- 3b4:       10 00
540- 3b6:       48 8b 05 00 00 00 00    mov    0(%rip),%rax        #
3bd <paging_init+0x28>
541- 3bd:       48 89 44 24 10          mov    %rax,0x10(%rsp)
542- 3c2:       48 89 e7                mov    %rsp,%rdi
543- 3c5:       e8 00 00 00 00          callq  3ca <paging_init+0x35>
544- 3ca:       48 83 c4 28             add    $0x28,%rsp
545- 3ce:       c3                      retq
546-
547-00000000000003cf <alloc_low_page>:
548- 3cf:       41 56                   push   %r14


>
> I bet, that will be a key for success. And if you are interested in such
> optimizations, why not to grep whole source tree for this kind of
> things? I'm not sure one function in arch/x86_64 is only such ``unoptimized''.
> And after doing that maybe you will see, that "{}" initializer can be
> applied not only to integer values (you did init with of *long int*,
> with *int*, btw), but to structs and others.
with '{}' initializer, gcc will fill its memory with zeros.

to other potential points to be optimized, I only see this trivial as
the first point, I wonder how people gives comments on this; and if
this optimization can be tested correctly, this can be done as an
optimization example and I'll try others.

>
> Ahh, one more thing about _optimizing_ your time, i.e. not wasting one.
>
> Add to CC list people, who already did reply on you patch. Otherwise
> you are showing your disrespect for them and hiding from further
> discussion.
Thank you, I know it and I've already subscribed the linux kernel
mailing list(linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org) so that I won't miss any
further discussion about it.

>
> I think you do not, but Linux development not have an automatic system
> for patch tracking, so you are on your own with your text editor and
> e-mail client on this. Please take care for your time.
What about that?
Do you mean something such as git by "an automatic system"?

>
> --
>   frenzy
> -o--=O`C
>  #oo'L O
> <___=E M
>


-- 
Denis Cheng
Linux Application Developer

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Oleg Verych]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 08:58:10PM +0800, rae l wrote:
> On 6/23/07, Oleg Verych <olecom@flower.upol.cz> wrote:
> >Why not just show actual objdump output on code (maybe with different
> >oxygen atoms used in gcc), rather than *talking* about optimization and
> >standards, hm?
> here is the objdump output of the two object files:
> As you could see, the older one used 0x38 bytes stack space while the
> new one used 0x28 bytes,
> and the object code is two bytes less,

Actually more: $((0x3d9 - 0x3ce))

> I think all these benefits are the gcc's __builtin_memset optimization
> than the explicit call to memset.

... or from complex memset() implementation (some chips even didn't do
`rep' fast enough somehow). Maybe code like below will be acceptable for
both optimizers and maintainers?

|-*-
        unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES] = {
                [ZONE_DMA] = MAX_DMA_PFN,
                [ZONE_DMA32] = MAX_DMA32_PFN,
                [ZONE_NORMAL] = end_pfn,
                [ZONE_MOVABLE] = 0UL
        };
|-*-

> $ objdump -d /tmp/init.orig.o|grep -A23 -nw '<paging_init>'
[]
> 547- 3d9:       c3                      retq
[]
> 545- 3ce:       c3                      retq
[]
> >
> >I bet, that will be a key for success. And if you are interested in such
> >optimizations, why not to grep whole source tree for this kind of
> >things? I'm not sure one function in arch/x86_64 is only such 
> >``unoptimized''.
> >And after doing that maybe you will see, that "{}" initializer can be
> >applied not only to integer values (you did init with of *long int*,
> >with *int*, btw), but to structs and others.
> with '{}' initializer, gcc will fill its memory with zeros.
> 
> to other potential points to be optimized, I only see this trivial as
> the first point, I wonder how people gives comments on this; and if
> this optimization can be tested correctly, this can be done as an
> optimization example and I'll try others.

Yes, comments and discussion is most important thing. But with such
propositions you will be better in the kernel-janitors list.

> >
> >Ahh, one more thing about _optimizing_ your time, i.e. not wasting one.
> >
> >Add to CC list people, who already did reply on you patch. Otherwise
> >you are showing your disrespect for them and hiding from further
> >discussion.
> Thank you, I know it and I've already subscribed the linux kernel
> mailing list(linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org) so that I won't miss any
> further discussion about it.

OK, but news<=>e-mail service, like Gmane is much nicer.

> >
> >I think you do not, but Linux development not have an automatic system
> >for patch tracking, so you are on your own with your text editor and
> >e-mail client on this. Please take care for your time.
> What about that?
> Do you mean something such as git by "an automatic system"?

That was a side note.
____

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Arjan van de Ven]

> > I think all these benefits are the gcc's __builtin_memset optimization
> > than the explicit call to memset.
> 
> ... or from complex memset() implementation (some chips even didn't do
> `rep' fast enough somehow). Maybe code like below will be acceptable for
> both optimizers and maintainers?


we should just alias our memset to the __builtin one, and then provide a
generic one from lib/ for the cases gcc needs to do a fallback.

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Benjamin LaHaise]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 03:15:17PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> we should just alias our memset to the __builtin one, and then provide a
> generic one from lib/ for the cases gcc needs to do a fallback.

The last time I checked, gcc generated horrible badly performing code for 
builtin memset/memcpy() when -Os is specified.

		-ben
-- 
"Time is of no importance, Mr. President, only life is important."
Don't Email: <zyntrop@kvack.org>.

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Arjan van de Ven]

On Sun, 2007-06-24 at 19:23 -0400, Benjamin LaHaise wrote:
> On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 03:15:17PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > we should just alias our memset to the __builtin one, and then provide a
> > generic one from lib/ for the cases gcc needs to do a fallback.
> 
> The last time I checked, gcc generated horrible badly performing code for 
> builtin memset/memcpy() when -Os is specified.

if you care about the last cycle, don't specify -Os but -O2.
simple as that... you get what you tell the compiler you want.

-- 
if you want to mail me at work (you don't), use arjan (at) linux.intel.com
Test the interaction between Linux and your BIOS via http://www.linuxfirmwarekit.org

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Benjamin LaHaise]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 05:09:16PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> if you care about the last cycle, don't specify -Os but -O2.
> simple as that... you get what you tell the compiler you want.

Certain distros are shipping kernels compiled with -Os.  And it's more 
than just a couple of cycles.

		-ben
-- 
"Time is of no importance, Mr. President, only life is important."
Don't Email: <zyntrop@kvack.org>.

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Arjan van de Ven]

On Sun, 2007-06-24 at 20:12 -0400, Benjamin LaHaise wrote:
> On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 05:09:16PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > if you care about the last cycle, don't specify -Os but -O2.
> > simple as that... you get what you tell the compiler you want.
> 
> Certain distros are shipping kernels compiled with -Os.  And it's more 
> than just a couple of cycles.

so those distros pick space over some cycles. Who are you to then
override that choice ? ;-)

seriously, why are we even talking about overriding a choice the user
(or distro vendor as user) made here?

-- 
if you want to mail me at work (you don't), use arjan (at) linux.intel.com
Test the interaction between Linux and your BIOS via http://www.linuxfirmwarekit.org

-Os versus -O2

[Adrian Bunk]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 05:23:42PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> On Sun, 2007-06-24 at 20:12 -0400, Benjamin LaHaise wrote:
> > On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 05:09:16PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > > if you care about the last cycle, don't specify -Os but -O2.
> > > simple as that... you get what you tell the compiler you want.
> > 
> > Certain distros are shipping kernels compiled with -Os.  And it's more 
> > than just a couple of cycles.
> 
> so those distros pick space over some cycles. Who are you to then
> override that choice ? ;-)
> 
> seriously, why are we even talking about overriding a choice the user
> (or distro vendor as user) made here?

There is a real issue in the fact that compiling with -Os is available
through a kconfig option and AFAIR used by some distributions.

I doubt distros enable CONFIG_CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE due to size 
considerations, but due to speed considerations.

I wouldn't care if CONFIG_CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE was hidden behind
CONFIG_EMBEDDED, but as long as it's available as a general purpose
option we have to consider it's performance.

The interesting questions are:
Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
If yes, why?

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Arjan van de Ven]

> I wouldn't care if CONFIG_CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE was hidden behind
> CONFIG_EMBEDDED, but as long as it's available as a general purpose
> option we have to consider it's performance.

I think you are missing the point. You tell the kernel to
OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE. *over performance*. Sure. Performance shouldn't be
EXTREMELY pathetic, but it's not; and if it were, it's a problem with
the gcc version you have (and if you are a distro, you can surely fix
that)

> 
> The interesting questions are:
> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
> If yes, why?

on a system level, size can help performance because you have more
memory available for other things.  It also reduces download size and
gives you more space on the live CD....

if you want to make things bigger again, please do this OUTSIDE the
"optimize for size" option. Because that TELLS you to go for size.

-- 
if you want to mail me at work (you don't), use arjan (at) linux.intel.com
Test the interaction between Linux and your BIOS via http://www.linuxfirmwarekit.org

Re: -Os versus -O2

[david]

On Sun, 24 Jun 2007, Arjan van de Ven wrote:

>> I wouldn't care if CONFIG_CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE was hidden behind
>> CONFIG_EMBEDDED, but as long as it's available as a general purpose
>> option we have to consider it's performance.
>
> I think you are missing the point. You tell the kernel to
> OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE. *over performance*. Sure. Performance shouldn't be
> EXTREMELY pathetic, but it's not; and if it were, it's a problem with
> the gcc version you have (and if you are a distro, you can surely fix
> that)
>
>>
>> The interesting questions are:
>> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
>> If yes, why?
>
> on a system level, size can help performance because you have more
> memory available for other things.  It also reduces download size and
> gives you more space on the live CD....
>
> if you want to make things bigger again, please do this OUTSIDE the
> "optimize for size" option. Because that TELLS you to go for size.

then do we need a new option 'optimize for best overall performance' that 
goes for size (and the corresponding wins there) most of the time, but is 
ignored where it makes a huge difference?

I started useing Os several years ago, even when it was hidden in the 
embedded menu becouse in many cases the smaller binary ended up being 
faster.

in reality this was a flaw in gcc that on modern CPU's with the larger 
difference between CPU speed and memory speed it still preferred to unroll 
loops (eating more memory and blowing out the cpu cache) when it shouldn't 
have.

if that has been fixed on later versions of gcc this would be a good 
thing. if it hasn't (possibly in part due to gcc optimizations being 
designed to be cross platform) then either the current 'go for size' or a 
hybrid 'performance' option is needed.

David Lang

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Arjan van de Ven]

On Sun, 2007-06-24 at 18:08 -0700, david@lang.hm wrote:
> >
> > on a system level, size can help performance because you have more
> > memory available for other things.  It also reduces download size and
> > gives you more space on the live CD....
> >
> > if you want to make things bigger again, please do this OUTSIDE the
> > "optimize for size" option. Because that TELLS you to go for size.
> 
> then do we need a new option 'optimize for best overall performance' that 
> goes for size (and the corresponding wins there) most of the time, but is 
> ignored where it makes a huge difference?

that isn't so easy. Anything which doesn't have a performance tradeoff
is in -O2 already. So every single thing in -Os costs you performance on
a micro level.

The translation to macro level depends greatly on how things are used
(you even have to factor in download times etc)... so that is a fair
question to leave up to the user... which is what there is today.

-- 
if you want to mail me at work (you don't), use arjan (at) linux.intel.com
Test the interaction between Linux and your BIOS via http://www.linuxfirmwarekit.org

Re: -Os versus -O2

[david]

On Sun, 24 Jun 2007, Arjan van de Ven wrote:

> On Sun, 2007-06-24 at 18:08 -0700, david@lang.hm wrote:
>>>
>>> on a system level, size can help performance because you have more
>>> memory available for other things.  It also reduces download size and
>>> gives you more space on the live CD....
>>>
>>> if you want to make things bigger again, please do this OUTSIDE the
>>> "optimize for size" option. Because that TELLS you to go for size.
>>
>> then do we need a new option 'optimize for best overall performance' that
>> goes for size (and the corresponding wins there) most of the time, but is
>> ignored where it makes a huge difference?
>
> that isn't so easy. Anything which doesn't have a performance tradeoff
> is in -O2 already. So every single thing in -Os costs you performance on
> a micro level.

this has not been true in the past (assuming that it's true today)

ok, if you look at a micro-enough level this may be true, but completely 
ignoring things like download times, the optimizations almost always boil 
down to trying to avoid jumps, loops, and decision logic at the expense of 
space.

however recent cpu's are significantly better as handling jumps and loops, 
and the cost of cache misses is significantly worse.

is the list of what's included in -O2 vs -Os different for different 
CPU's? what about within a single family of processors? (even in the x86 
family the costs of jumps, loops, and cache misses varies drasticly)

my understanding was that the optimizations for O2 were pretty fixed.

> The translation to macro level depends greatly on how things are used
> (you even have to factor in download times etc)... so that is a fair
> question to leave up to the user... which is what there is today.

ignore things like download time for the moment. it's not significant to 
most people as they don't download things that often, and when they do 
they are almost always downloading lots of stuff they don't need (drivers 
for example)

users are trying to get better performance 90+% of the time when they 
select -Os. That's why it got moved out of CONFIG_EMBEDDED.

David Lang

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Rene Herman]

On 06/25/2007 03:33 AM, david@lang.hm wrote:

> is the list of what's included in -O2 vs -Os different for different 
> CPU's? what about within a single family of processors? (even in the x86 
> family the costs of jumps, loops, and cache misses varies drasticly)

At least not in the example Duron/Athlon case. Both -march=athlon{,-4) but 
64K versus 256K L2 which I'd expect to be an important difference in the -Os 
versus -O2 behaviour.

Rene.

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Willy Tarreau]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 06:33:15PM -0700, david@lang.hm wrote:
> On Sun, 24 Jun 2007, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> 
> >On Sun, 2007-06-24 at 18:08 -0700, david@lang.hm wrote:
> >>>
> >>>on a system level, size can help performance because you have more
> >>>memory available for other things.  It also reduces download size and
> >>>gives you more space on the live CD....
> >>>
> >>>if you want to make things bigger again, please do this OUTSIDE the
> >>>"optimize for size" option. Because that TELLS you to go for size.
> >>
> >>then do we need a new option 'optimize for best overall performance' that
> >>goes for size (and the corresponding wins there) most of the time, but is
> >>ignored where it makes a huge difference?
> >
> >that isn't so easy. Anything which doesn't have a performance tradeoff
> >is in -O2 already. So every single thing in -Os costs you performance on
> >a micro level.
> 
> this has not been true in the past (assuming that it's true today)
> 
> ok, if you look at a micro-enough level this may be true, but completely 
> ignoring things like download times, the optimizations almost always boil 
> down to trying to avoid jumps, loops, and decision logic at the expense of 
> space.
> 
> however recent cpu's are significantly better as handling jumps and loops, 
> and the cost of cache misses is significantly worse.
> 
> is the list of what's included in -O2 vs -Os different for different 
> CPU's? what about within a single family of processors? (even in the x86 
> family the costs of jumps, loops, and cache misses varies drasticly)
> 
> my understanding was that the optimizations for O2 were pretty fixed.
> 
> >The translation to macro level depends greatly on how things are used
> >(you even have to factor in download times etc)... so that is a fair
> >question to leave up to the user... which is what there is today.
> 
> ignore things like download time for the moment. it's not significant to 
> most people as they don't download things that often, and when they do 
> they are almost always downloading lots of stuff they don't need (drivers 
> for example)
> 
> users are trying to get better performance 90+% of the time when they 
> select -Os. That's why it got moved out of CONFIG_EMBEDDED.

In my experience, -Os produced faster code on gcc-2.95 than -O2 or -O3.
It was not only because of cache considerations, but because gcc used
different tricks to avoid poor optimizations, and at the end, the CPU
ended executing the alternative code faster.

With gcc-3.3, -Os show roughly the same performance as -O2 for me on
various programs. However, with gcc-3.4, I noticed a slow down with
-Os. And with gcc-4, using -Os optimizes only for size, even if the
output code is slow as hell. I've had programs whose speed dropped
by 70% using -Os on gcc-4. But their size was smaller than with older
versions.

But in some situtations, it's desirable to have the smallest possible
kernel whatever its performance. This goes for installation CDs for
instance.

Willy

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Segher Boessenkool]

> In my experience, -Os produced faster code on gcc-2.95 than -O2 or -O3.

On what CPU?  The effect of different optimisations varies
hugely between different CPUs (and architectures).

> It was not only because of cache considerations, but because gcc used
> different tricks to avoid poor optimizations, and at the end, the CPU
> ended executing the alternative code faster.

-Os is "as fast as you can without bloating the code size",
so that is the expected result for CPUs that don't need
special hand-holding around certain performance pitfalls.

> With gcc-3.3, -Os show roughly the same performance as -O2 for me on
> various programs. However, with gcc-3.4, I noticed a slow down with
> -Os. And with gcc-4, using -Os optimizes only for size, even if the
> output code is slow as hell. I've had programs whose speed dropped
> by 70% using -Os on gcc-4.

Well you better report those!  <http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla>

> But in some situtations, it's desirable to have the smallest possible
> kernel whatever its performance. This goes for installation CDs for
> instance.

There are much better ways to achieve that.


Segher

Re: -Os versus -O2

[david]

On Mon, 25 Jun 2007, Segher Boessenkool wrote:

>>  In my experience, -Os produced faster code on gcc-2.95 than -O2 or -O3.
>
> On what CPU?  The effect of different optimisations varies
> hugely between different CPUs (and architectures).
>
>>  It was not only because of cache considerations, but because gcc used
>>  different tricks to avoid poor optimizations, and at the end, the CPU
>>  ended executing the alternative code faster.
>
> -Os is "as fast as you can without bloating the code size",
> so that is the expected result for CPUs that don't need
> special hand-holding around certain performance pitfalls.

this sounds like you are saying that people wanting performance should 
pick -Os.

what should people pick who care more about code size then anything else? 
(examples being embedded development where you may be willing to sacrafice 
speed to avoid having to add additional chips to the design)

David Lang

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Segher Boessenkool]

>> -Os is "as fast as you can without bloating the code size",
>> so that is the expected result for CPUs that don't need
>> special hand-holding around certain performance pitfalls.
>
> this sounds like you are saying that people wanting performance should 
> pick -Os.

That is true on most CPUs.  Some CPUs really really need
some of things that -Os disables (compared to -O2) for
decent performance though (branch target alignment...)

> what should people pick who care more about code size then anything 
> else? (examples being embedded development where you may be willing to 
> sacrafice speed to avoid having to add additional chips to the design)

-Os and tune some options.  There is extensive work being
done over the last few years to make GCC more suitable for
embedded targets btw.  But the -O1/-O2/-O3/-Os gives you
four choices only, it's really not so hard to understand
I hope that for more specific goals you need to add more
specific options?


Segher

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Willy Tarreau]

On Mon, Jun 25, 2007 at 09:08:23AM +0200, Segher Boessenkool wrote:
> >In my experience, -Os produced faster code on gcc-2.95 than -O2 or -O3.
> 
> On what CPU?  The effect of different optimisations varies
> hugely between different CPUs (and architectures).

x86

> >It was not only because of cache considerations, but because gcc used
> >different tricks to avoid poor optimizations, and at the end, the CPU
> >ended executing the alternative code faster.
> 
> -Os is "as fast as you can without bloating the code size",
> so that is the expected result for CPUs that don't need
> special hand-holding around certain performance pitfalls.
> 
> >With gcc-3.3, -Os show roughly the same performance as -O2 for me on
> >various programs. However, with gcc-3.4, I noticed a slow down with
> >-Os. And with gcc-4, using -Os optimizes only for size, even if the
> >output code is slow as hell. I've had programs whose speed dropped
> >by 70% using -Os on gcc-4.
> 
> Well you better report those!  <http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla>

No, -Os is for size only :

       -Os Optimize for size.  -Os enables all -O2 optimizations
           that do not typically increase code size.  It also
           performs further optimizations designed to reduce code
           size.

So it is expected that speed can be reduced using -Os. I won't report
a thing which is already documented !

> >But in some situtations, it's desirable to have the smallest possible
> >kernel whatever its performance. This goes for installation CDs for
> >instance.
> 
> There are much better ways to achieve that.

Optimizing is not a matter of choosing *one* way, but cumulating
everything you have. For instance, on a smart boot loader, I have
a kernel which is about 300 kB, or 700 kB with the initramfs. Among
the tricks I used :
  - -Os
  - -march=i386
  - align everything to 0
  - replace gzip with p7zip

Even if each of them reduces overall size by 5%, the net result is
0.95^4 = 0.81 = 19% gain, for the same set of features. This is
something to consider.

Regards,
Willy

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Segher Boessenkool]

>>> In my experience, -Os produced faster code on gcc-2.95 than -O2 or 
>>> -O3.
>>
>> On what CPU?  The effect of different optimisations varies
>> hugely between different CPUs (and architectures).
>
> x86

That's not a CPU, that's an architecture.  I hope you
understand there are very big differences between different
members of the x86 family and you don't compare 2.95 on a
Pentium class CPU to 3.x on an Opteron or 4.x on a Pentium4
or something like that.

>>> With gcc-3.3, -Os show roughly the same performance as -O2 for me on
>>> various programs. However, with gcc-3.4, I noticed a slow down with
>>> -Os. And with gcc-4, using -Os optimizes only for size, even if the
>>> output code is slow as hell. I've had programs whose speed dropped
>>> by 70% using -Os on gcc-4.
>>
>> Well you better report those!  <http://gcc.gnu.org/bugzilla>
>
> No, -Os is for size only :
>
>        -Os Optimize for size.  -Os enables all -O2 optimizations
>            that do not typically increase code size.  It also
>            performs further optimizations designed to reduce code
>            size.

That is not "for size only".  Please read again.

A 70% speed decrease is something that should be at least
investigated, even if then perhaps it is decided GCC already
does the "right thing".

> So it is expected that speed can be reduced using -Os. I won't report
> a thing which is already documented !

A few percent points slower is expected, 20% would be
explainable, but 70%?

-O2 and -Os are supposed to differ in _minor_ ways.  Such
a huge performance drop is unexpected.  If you file the PR,
feel free to blame me for reporting it at all.

>>> But in some situtations, it's desirable to have the smallest possible
>>> kernel whatever its performance. This goes for installation CDs for
>>> instance.
>>
>> There are much better ways to achieve that.
>
> Optimizing is not a matter of choosing *one* way, but cumulating
> everything you have.

Yes of course.  I'm just saying -Os is a pretty minor step
in the overall making-things-smaller game.  Leaving out XFS
helps a whole megabyte on my default target, for example.

> For instance, on a smart boot loader, I have
> a kernel which is about 300 kB, or 700 kB with the initramfs. Among
> the tricks I used :
>   - -Os
>   - -march=i386
>   - align everything to 0
>   - replace gzip with p7zip
>
> Even if each of them reduces overall size by 5%, the net result is
> 0.95^4 = 0.81 = 19% gain, for the same set of features. This is
> something to consider.

Sure.  I don't think making -Os mean "as small as possible
in all cases" (or, rather, introducing a new option for that)
would help terribly much over the current -Os meaning -- a
few percent at most.  That's not to say that no such optimisations
are added anymore, but mostly they turn out not to decrease
speed at all and so are enabled at any -O level :-)


Segher

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Segher Boessenkool]

> then do we need a new option 'optimize for best overall performance' 
> that goes for size (and the corresponding wins there) most of the 
> time, but is ignored where it makes a huge difference?

That's -Os mostly.  Some awful CPUs really need higher
loop/label/function alignment though to get any
performance; you could add -falign-xxx options for those.

> in reality this was a flaw in gcc that on modern CPU's with the larger 
> difference between CPU speed and memory speed it still preferred to 
> unroll loops (eating more memory and blowing out the cpu cache) when 
> it shouldn't have.

You told it to unroll loops, so it did.  No flaw.  If you
feel the optimisations enabled by -O2 should depend on the
CPU tuning selected, please file a PR.

Also note that whether or not it is profitable to unroll
a particular loop depends largely on how "hot" that loop
is, and GCC doesn't know much about that if you don't feed
it profiling information (it can guess a bit, sure, but it
can guess wrong too).


Segher

Re: -Os versus -O2

[david]

On Mon, 25 Jun 2007, Segher Boessenkool wrote:

>>  then do we need a new option 'optimize for best overall performance' that
>>  goes for size (and the corresponding wins there) most of the time, but is
>>  ignored where it makes a huge difference?
>
> That's -Os mostly.  Some awful CPUs really need higher
> loop/label/function alignment though to get any
> performance; you could add -falign-xxx options for those.
>
>>  in reality this was a flaw in gcc that on modern CPU's with the larger
>>  difference between CPU speed and memory speed it still preferred to unroll
>>  loops (eating more memory and blowing out the cpu cache) when it shouldn't
>>  have.
>
> You told it to unroll loops, so it did.  No flaw.  If you
> feel the optimisations enabled by -O2 should depend on the
> CPU tuning selected, please file a PR.
>
> Also note that whether or not it is profitable to unroll
> a particular loop depends largely on how "hot" that loop
> is, and GCC doesn't know much about that if you don't feed
> it profiling information (it can guess a bit, sure, but it
> can guess wrong too).

actually, what you are saying is that the compiler can't know enough to 
figure out how to optimize for speed. it will just do what you tell it to, 
either unroll loops or not.

this argues that both O2 and Os are incorrect for a project to use and 
instead the project needs to make it's own decisions on this.

if this is the true feeling of the gcc team I'm very disappointed, it 
feels like a huge step backwards.

David Lang

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Segher Boessenkool]

>> Also note that whether or not it is profitable to unroll
>> a particular loop depends largely on how "hot" that loop
>> is, and GCC doesn't know much about that if you don't feed
>> it profiling information (it can guess a bit, sure, but it
>> can guess wrong too).
>
> actually, what you are saying is that the compiler can't know enough 
> to figure out how to optimize for speed. it will just do what you tell 
> it to, either unroll loops or not.

It bases its optimisation decisions on the options you give
it, the profile feedback information you either or not gave
it, and a whole bunch of heuristics.

> this argues that both O2 and Os are incorrect for a project to use and 
> instead the project needs to make it's own decisions on this.

For optimal performance, you need to fine-tune options yes,
per file (or per function even!)

> if this is the true feeling of the gcc team I'm very disappointed, it 
> feels like a huge step backwards.

I speak only for myself.  However this is the only way it _can_
be, the compiler isn't clairvoyant.  Some of the heuristics sure
could use some tuning, but they stay heuristics.


Segher

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Adrian Bunk]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 05:58:46PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> 
> > I wouldn't care if CONFIG_CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE was hidden behind
> > CONFIG_EMBEDDED, but as long as it's available as a general purpose
> > option we have to consider it's performance.
> 
> I think you are missing the point. You tell the kernel to
> OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE. *over performance*. Sure. Performance shouldn't be
> EXTREMELY pathetic, but it's not; and if it were, it's a problem with
> the gcc version you have (and if you are a distro, you can surely fix
> that)

My point is commit c45b4f1f1e149c023762ac4be166ead1818cefef

CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE is currently known as an experimental feature to 
improve the _performance_.

> > The interesting questions are:
> > Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
> > If yes, why?
> 
> on a system level, size can help performance because you have more
> memory available for other things.

For a given gcc version, there's a finite number of differences between 
-Os and -O2. 

The interesting question is for which differences with gcc 4.2 we want 
the -Os version in the kernel for best performance. This should then be 
controllable through gcc options.

> It also reduces download size and 
> gives you more space on the live CD....

That's a different point.

If you don't care about performance but care about size then -Os is 
the best choice.

> if you want to make things bigger again, please do this OUTSIDE the
> "optimize for size" option. Because that TELLS you to go for size.

Agreed, but CONFIG_CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE should again be under 
CONFIG_EMBEDDED.

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Rene Herman]

On 06/25/2007 02:41 AM, Adrian Bunk wrote:

> The interesting questions are:
> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
> If yes, why?

I would wager that the CPU type makes more of a difference than the compiler 
version. That is, I'd expect my Duron with it's "puny" 64K L1 to have a very 
different profile than it's Athlon brother with 256K L1. Not to mention CPUs 
with as little as 8K L1 (P1).

I can't quote numbers -- it's a bit hard to test those things anyway as it's 
a system-global effect and not su much that's easily isolated in a dedicated 
benchmark.

Rene.

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Rene Herman]

On 06/25/2007 03:23 AM, Rene Herman wrote:

> On 06/25/2007 02:41 AM, Adrian Bunk wrote:
> 
>> The interesting questions are:
>> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
>> If yes, why?
> 
> I would wager that the CPU type makes more of a difference than the 
> compiler version. That is, I'd expect my Duron with it's "puny" 64K L1 
> to have a very different profile than it's Athlon brother with 256K L1.

Sorry, that should've been L2. And "its" ...

  > Not to mention CPUs with as little as 8K L1 (P1).
> 
> I can't quote numbers -- it's a bit hard to test those things anyway as 
> it's a system-global effect and not su much that's easily isolated in a 
> dedicated benchmark.

And while I'm at it, "and not so much one that's [ ...]".

Rene.

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Jeff Garzik]

Adrian Bunk wrote:
> The interesting questions are:
> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
> If yes, why?

Smaller code can mean fewer page faults, fewer cache invalidations, etc.

It's not just a matter of compiler code generation, gotta look at the 
whole picture.

	Jeff

Re: -Os versus -O2

[Adrian Bunk]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 09:34:05PM -0400, Jeff Garzik wrote:
> Adrian Bunk wrote:
>> The interesting questions are:
>> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
>> If yes, why?
>
> Smaller code can mean fewer page faults, fewer cache invalidations, etc.
>
> It's not just a matter of compiler code generation, gotta look at the whole 
> picture.

Sure, but my point is that if the kernel is considered special and the 
best optimization for the kernel is therefore between -Os and -O2, we 
should try to find this point of best optimization.

This should address Arjans point that -Os might not be best choice for 
best performance (and it's actually our fault if gcc generates stupid 
but small code when we use -Os).

> 	Jeff

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: -Os versus -O2

[david]

On Mon, 25 Jun 2007, Adrian Bunk wrote:

> On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 09:34:05PM -0400, Jeff Garzik wrote:
>> Adrian Bunk wrote:
>>> The interesting questions are:
>>> Does -Os still sometimes generate faster code with gcc 4.2?
>>> If yes, why?
>>
>> Smaller code can mean fewer page faults, fewer cache invalidations, etc.
>>
>> It's not just a matter of compiler code generation, gotta look at the whole
>> picture.

the picture gets even murkier when you consider that even if neither 
option overflows the cpu cache the one that takes more space in the cache 
leaves less space in the cache for the userspacde code that the system is 
actually there to run.

> Sure, but my point is that if the kernel is considered special and the
> best optimization for the kernel is therefore between -Os and -O2, we
> should try to find this point of best optimization.
>
> This should address Arjans point that -Os might not be best choice for
> best performance (and it's actually our fault if gcc generates stupid
> but small code when we use -Os).

what can be done to find the horribly bad but small code among the "it's 
smaller and would be less efficiant if you didn't consider the cache" 
majority?

David Lang

memset() with zeroes (Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization)

[Oleg Verych]

On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 03:15:17PM -0700, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> 
> > > I think all these benefits are the gcc's __builtin_memset optimization
> > > than the explicit call to memset.
> > 
> > ... or from complex memset() implementation (some chips even didn't do
> > `rep' fast enough somehow). Maybe code like below will be acceptable for
> > both optimizers and maintainers?
> 
> 
> we should just alias our memset to the __builtin one, and then provide a
> generic one from lib/ for the cases gcc needs to do a fallback.

In x86_64 there's infrastructure to check and select right memset().
Therefor it's need, i think.

But if one will took a look at usage, zero memset() optimization becomes
obvious, one argument off -- one reg is free from clobbering.

|-*-
flower-:22-rc4-mm2/arch/x86_64$ grep memset -R . | grep "[ 0,]0," | wc -l
42
flower-:22-rc4-mm2/arch/x86_64$
flower-:22-rc4-mm2/arch/x86_64$ cd ..
flower-:22-rc4-mm2/arch$ grep memset -R . | grep "[ 0,]0," | wc -l
735
flower-:22-rc4-mm2/arch$
flower-:22-rc4-mm2$ grep memset -R . | grep "[ 0,]0," | wc -l
6679
flower-:22-rc4-mm2$  
|-*-
____

[PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Denis Cheng]

From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>

the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.

Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>

---
Is there some comments on this?

--- arch/x86_64/mm/init.c.orig	2007-06-07 10:08:04.000000000 +0800
+++ arch/x86_64/mm/init.c	2007-06-18 14:43:15.000000000 +0800
@@ -406,8 +406,7 @@ void __cpuinit zap_low_mappings(int cpu)
 #ifndef CONFIG_NUMA
 void __init paging_init(void)
 {
-	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES];
-	memset(max_zone_pfns, 0, sizeof(max_zone_pfns));
+	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES] = { 0, };
 	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_DMA] = MAX_DMA_PFN;
 	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_DMA32] = MAX_DMA32_PFN;
 	max_zone_pfns[ZONE_NORMAL] = end_pfn;

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Robert P. J. Day]

On Mon, 18 Jun 2007, Denis Cheng wrote:

> From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>
> the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
>
> Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>
> ---
> Is there some comments on this?
>
> --- arch/x86_64/mm/init.c.orig	2007-06-07 10:08:04.000000000 +0800
> +++ arch/x86_64/mm/init.c	2007-06-18 14:43:15.000000000 +0800
> @@ -406,8 +406,7 @@ void __cpuinit zap_low_mappings(int cpu)
>  #ifndef CONFIG_NUMA
>  void __init paging_init(void)
>  {
> -	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES];
> -	memset(max_zone_pfns, 0, sizeof(max_zone_pfns));
> +	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES] = { 0, };

the drawback i see to this is that it's *visually* misleading.  it
*appears* that what the programmer is trying to do is just initialize
the first element, not all of them -- regardless of the actual effect.

rday
-- 
========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry
Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA

http://fsdev.net/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
========================================================================

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[WANG Cong]

On Mon, Jun 18, 2007 at 06:25:17AM -0400, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
>On Mon, 18 Jun 2007, Denis Cheng wrote:
>
>> From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>>
>> the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
>> thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
>>
>> Signed-off-by: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>>
>> ---
>> Is there some comments on this?
>>
>> --- arch/x86_64/mm/init.c.orig	2007-06-07 10:08:04.000000000 +0800
>> +++ arch/x86_64/mm/init.c	2007-06-18 14:43:15.000000000 +0800
>> @@ -406,8 +406,7 @@ void __cpuinit zap_low_mappings(int cpu)
>>  #ifndef CONFIG_NUMA
>>  void __init paging_init(void)
>>  {
>> -	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES];
>> -	memset(max_zone_pfns, 0, sizeof(max_zone_pfns));
>> +	unsigned long max_zone_pfns[MAX_NR_ZONES] = { 0, };
>
>the drawback i see to this is that it's *visually* misleading.  it
>*appears* that what the programmer is trying to do is just initialize
>the first element, not all of them -- regardless of the actual effect.
>

C standard can guarantee all of them are initialized, and this is _not_
hard to understand for a good C programmer.

Ack for Denis's change.

Regards!

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Jeremy Fitzhardinge]

Denis Cheng wrote:
> From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
>
> the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
>   

How does the generated code change?  Does gcc do something stupid like
statically allocate a prototype structure full of zeros, and then memcpy
it in?  Or does it generate a series of explicit assignments for each
member?  Or does it generate a memset anyway?

Seems to me that this gives gcc the opportunity to be more stupid, and
the only right answer is what we're doing anyway.

    J

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[Adrian Bunk]

On Mon, Jun 18, 2007 at 10:07:21AM -0700, Jeremy Fitzhardinge wrote:
> Denis Cheng wrote:
> > From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> >
> > the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> > thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
> 
> How does the generated code change?  Does gcc do something stupid like
> statically allocate a prototype structure full of zeros, and then memcpy
> it in?  Or does it generate a series of explicit assignments for each
> member?  Or does it generate a memset anyway?
> 
> Seems to me that this gives gcc the opportunity to be more stupid, and
> the only right answer is what we're doing anyway.

I checked with gcc 4.2, and gcc is quite clever:

If an array is big, gcc uses memset.
If an array is small, gcc does it directly in assembler.

>     J

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed

Re: [PATCH] trivial: the memset operation on a automatic array variable should be optimized out by data initialization

[rae l]

On 6/19/07, Jeremy Fitzhardinge <jeremy@goop.org> wrote:
> Denis Cheng wrote:
> > From: Denis Cheng <crquan@gmail.com>
> >
> > the explicit memset call could be optimized out by data initialization,
> > thus all the fill working can be done by the compiler implicitly.
> >
>
> How does the generated code change?  Does gcc do something stupid like
> statically allocate a prototype structure full of zeros, and then memcpy
> it in?  Or does it generate a series of explicit assignments for each
> member?  Or does it generate a memset anyway?
>
> Seems to me that this gives gcc the opportunity to be more stupid, and
> the only right answer is what we're doing anyway.
>
>     J
>
Technically speaking, C standard guarantees the data be initialized correctly;
just from the point view of code style, let the compiler selects how
to initialize will be better, this could let the compiler has more
optimization points.

-- 
Denis Cheng
Linux Application Developer