Re: [PATCH 4/8] x86: add support for remotely triggering the block softirq

Ingo Molnar
2008-02-07T10:26:52Z

* Jens Axboe <jens.axboe@oracle.com> wrote:

> > on the more conceptual level, shouldnt we just move to threads
> > instead of softirqs? That way you can become affine to any CPU and
> > can do cross-CPU wakeups anytime - which will be nice and fast via
> > the smp_reschedule_interrupt() facility.
>
> That would indeed be nicer and not require any arch changes. I was
> afraid it would be more costly than massaging the softirqs a bit
> though, perhaps that is unfounded.

pick up the threaded softirq patches from -rt, those move all softirqs
processing into kernel threads. I'd suggest to extend those via
wakeup-from-remote functionality - it fits the construct quite
naturally. You should also be able to directly observe any performance
impact of threaded softirq handlers. (and if you find any, let me know
so that we can make it faster :-)

Ingo