Re: [PATCH 0/4] Reinstate and improve MIPS `do_div' implementation

From: Thomas Bogendoerfer <tsbogend@alpha.franken.de>
To: "Maciej W. Rozycki" <macro@orcam.me.uk>
Cc: Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de>,
	Huacai Chen <chenhuacai@kernel.org>,
	Huacai Chen <chenhuacai@loongson.cn>,
	Jiaxun Yang <jiaxun.yang@flygoat.com>,
	linux-arch@vger.kernel.org, linux-mips@vger.kernel.org,
	linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 0/4] Reinstate and improve MIPS `do_div' implementation
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 2021 14:01:48 +0200	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <20210421120148.GC8637@alpha.franken.de> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.21.2104200044060.44318@angie.orcam.me.uk>

On Tue, Apr 20, 2021 at 04:50:22AM +0200, Maciej W. Rozycki wrote:
> Hi,
> 
>  As Huacai has recently discovered the MIPS backend for `do_div' has been 
> broken and inadvertently disabled with commit c21004cd5b4c ("MIPS: Rewrite 
> <asm/div64.h> to work with gcc 4.4.0.").  As it is code I have originally 
> written myself and Huacai had issues bringing it back to life leading to a 
> request to discard it even I have decided to step in.
> 
>  In the end I have fixed the code and measured its performance to be ~100% 
> better on average than our generic code.  I have decided it would be worth 
> having the test module I have prepared for correctness evaluation as well 
> as benchmarking, so I have included it with the series, also so that I can 
> refer to the results easily.
> 
>  In the end I have included four patches on this occasion: 1/4 is the test 
> module, 2/4 is an inline documentation fix/clarification for the `do_div' 
> wrapper, 3/4 enables the MIPS `__div64_32' backend and 4/4 adds a small 
> performance improvement to it.
> 
>  I have investigated a fifth change as a potential improvement where I 
> replaced the call to `do_div64_32' with a DIVU instruction for cases where 
> the high part of the intermediate divident is zero, but it has turned out 
> to regress performance a little, so I have discarded it.
> 
>  Also a follow-up change might be worth having to reduce the code size and 
> place `__div64_32' out of line for CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_SIZE configurations, 
> but I have not fully prepared such a change at this time.  I did use the 
> WIP form I have for performance evaluation however; see the figures quoted 
> with 4/4.
> 
>  These changes have been verified with a DECstation system with an R3400 
> MIPS I processor @40MHz and a MTI Malta system with a 5Kc MIPS64 processor 
> @160MHz.
> 
>  See individual change descriptions and any additional discussions for
> further details.
> 
>  Questions, comments or concerns?  Otherwise please apply.

series applied to mips-next.

Thomas.

-- 
Crap can work. Given enough thrust pigs will fly, but it's not necessarily a
good idea.                                                [ RFC1925, 2.3 ]