Re: [PATCH v2] clocksource: exynos-mct: Register the timer for stable udelay

Tomasz Figa
2014-06-19T16:41:15Z

On 19.06.2014 18:31, Doug Anderson wrote:
> Tomasz,
>
> On Thu, Jun 19, 2014 at 9:17 AM, Tomasz Figa <tomasz.figa@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 19.06.2014 18:01, Doug Anderson wrote:
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> On Thu, Jun 19, 2014 at 3:21 AM, Tomasz Figa <tomasz.figa@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> +static struct delay_timer exynos4_delay_timer;
>>>>> +
>>>>> +static unsigned long exynos4_read_current_timer(void)
>>>
>>> Note: I think this should return a cycles_t, not an unsigned long.
>>> They're the same (right now), but probably shouldn't be (see below).
>>>
>>>
>>>>> +{
>>>>> +#ifdef ARM
>>>>> + return __raw_readl(reg_base + EXYNOS4_MCT_G_CNT_L);
>>>>> +#else /* ARM64, etc */
>>>>> + return exynos4_frc_read(&mct_frc);
>>>>> +#endif
>>>>> +}
>>>>> +
>>>>
>>>> No need for anything like this. Even if running on ARM64, the delay
>>>> timer code should be able to cope with different timer widths. For
>>>> delays, 32 bits are enough, so just always read the lower part.
>>>
>>> I agree that the timer code should cope but it doesn't appear to. I see:
>>>
>>> cycles_t start = get_cycles();
>>> while ((get_cycles() - start) < cycles)
>>> cpu_relax();
>>>
>>> Right now cycles_t is defined as "unsigned long". If that's 64-bits
>>> on ARM64 then this function will have problems with wraparound.
>>
>> Well, first of all, I'm not sure why we're discussing ARM64 here, if it
>> doesn't have support for register_current_timer_delay() at all.
>> Moreover, the only user if it is ARM32 and, if I remember correctly, the
>> assumption was that you need a >= 32 bit timer to use it for delays and
>> so with 32 bit unsigned long everything should work. Now if ARM64 also
>> wants to use this infrastructure, instead of hacking drivers now and
>> encouraging ARM64 people to continue using this kind of hackery, I
>> believe we should indicate that ARM64 delay timer code needs to be
>> implemented correctly and cope for different timer widths.
>>
>> Of course the best way would be to redesign this interface right now to
>> consider time width (it is not just about 32 or 64 bits, there are
>> various timers, possibly 48- or 52-bit) and change ARM32 implementation
>> of it as well, if there are any volunteers.
>
> I was arguing that it was a lot of extra complexity to add to the code
> to support different timer sizes for udelay when 32-bits is enough
> (and it's trivial for timer implementations to truncate down to
> 32-bits).
>
>
>> Changing the code to always
>> use 32-bit type regardless of arch is also an option.
>
> Right, that's what I was arguing for.
>
>
>>> My personal vote would be to submit a patch to change "cycles_t" to
>>> always be 32-bits. Given that 32-bits was fine for udelay() for ARM
>>> that seems sane and simple. If someone later comes up with a super
>>> compelling reason why we need 64-bit timers for udelay (really??) then
>>> they can later add all the complexity needed.
>>
>> Yes, this could work. I'm not sure what else cycles_t is used for, though.
>
> True, it is a bit questionable to change this since it's a type that's
> not obviously just for udelay(). Perhaps a better option would be to
> make a new typedef for the result of read_current_timer(). ...or just
> change it to return a u32?
>

Sounds good to me, but let's hear other opinions. I'm adding Will and
Jonathan as they wrote the ARM delay timer code.

>
>>> Amit: can you code up such a patch and add it to the series? I know
>>> it changes code that touches all ARM devices but I still think it's
>>> the right thing to do and actually only really changes behavior on
>>> ARM64.
>>>
>>>
>>>> Also use of raw accessors in drivers is discouraged - please use
>>>> readl_relaxed().
>>>
>>> It doesn't seem like that should happen in the same patch. Perhaps
>>> Amit can do a cleanup patch first that changes all instances of
>>> __raw_readl / __raw_writel in this file, then submit his patch atop
>>> that.
>>
>> Why not? The patch adding exynos4_read_current_timer() (and so the call
>> to __raw_readl() was Amit's patch. I'm not asking to fix this in the
>> whole driver, just to do things correctly in new code.
>
> IMHO consistency within a file is more important. Having a single
> readl_relaxed() in a file that uses all __raw_readl() doesn't seem
> beneficial to me. ...but I certainly won't NAK the patch if that's
> what others want.
>

It depends whether you prefer consistency over correctness or the other
way around. I should have marked this comment as a nitpick. :)

>
>>>> Btw. I don't even see support for this on ARM64 in mainline, where arch
>>>> timer is always used for delays and AFAIK this is a platform requirement.
>>>
>>> Yeah, I'd vote for not using MCT on ARM64, but it I suppose it doesn't
>>> hurt to keep it working.
>>
>> Right now there is no need for this, so let's just keep things simple.
>
> It should at least have a comment saying that it's broken in subtle
> ways (only on udelays that happen to span the 32-bit wraparound) on
> anything where cycle_t is not 32-bits. Perhaps at least a:
> WARN_ON_ONCE(sizeof(cycles_t) != sizeof(u32));
>
> The above should be optimized by the compiler.

Sounds good as well. Or maybe even BUILD_BUG_ON_MSG() with proper error
message?

Best regards,
Tomasz