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diff --git a/Documentation/core-api/circular-buffers.rst b/Documentation/core-api/circular-buffers.rst new file mode 100644 index 000000000..53e51caa3 --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/core-api/circular-buffers.rst @@ -0,0 +1,237 @@ +================ +Circular Buffers +================ + +:Author: David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com> +:Author: Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@linux.vnet.ibm.com> + + +Linux provides a number of features that can be used to implement circular +buffering. There are two sets of such features: + + (1) Convenience functions for determining information about power-of-2 sized + buffers. + + (2) Memory barriers for when the producer and the consumer of objects in the + buffer don't want to share a lock. + +To use these facilities, as discussed below, there needs to be just one +producer and just one consumer. It is possible to handle multiple producers by +serialising them, and to handle multiple consumers by serialising them. + + +.. Contents: + + (*) What is a circular buffer? + + (*) Measuring power-of-2 buffers. + + (*) Using memory barriers with circular buffers. + - The producer. + - The consumer. + + + +What is a circular buffer? +========================== + +First of all, what is a circular buffer? A circular buffer is a buffer of +fixed, finite size into which there are two indices: + + (1) A 'head' index - the point at which the producer inserts items into the + buffer. + + (2) A 'tail' index - the point at which the consumer finds the next item in + the buffer. + +Typically when the tail pointer is equal to the head pointer, the buffer is +empty; and the buffer is full when the head pointer is one less than the tail +pointer. + +The head index is incremented when items are added, and the tail index when +items are removed. The tail index should never jump the head index, and both +indices should be wrapped to 0 when they reach the end of the buffer, thus +allowing an infinite amount of data to flow through the buffer. + +Typically, items will all be of the same unit size, but this isn't strictly +required to use the techniques below. The indices can be increased by more +than 1 if multiple items or variable-sized items are to be included in the +buffer, provided that neither index overtakes the other. The implementer must +be careful, however, as a region more than one unit in size may wrap the end of +the buffer and be broken into two segments. + +Measuring power-of-2 buffers +============================ + +Calculation of the occupancy or the remaining capacity of an arbitrarily sized +circular buffer would normally be a slow operation, requiring the use of a +modulus (divide) instruction. However, if the buffer is of a power-of-2 size, +then a much quicker bitwise-AND instruction can be used instead. + +Linux provides a set of macros for handling power-of-2 circular buffers. These +can be made use of by:: + + #include <linux/circ_buf.h> + +The macros are: + + (#) Measure the remaining capacity of a buffer:: + + CIRC_SPACE(head_index, tail_index, buffer_size); + + This returns the amount of space left in the buffer[1] into which items + can be inserted. + + + (#) Measure the maximum consecutive immediate space in a buffer:: + + CIRC_SPACE_TO_END(head_index, tail_index, buffer_size); + + This returns the amount of consecutive space left in the buffer[1] into + which items can be immediately inserted without having to wrap back to the + beginning of the buffer. + + + (#) Measure the occupancy of a buffer:: + + CIRC_CNT(head_index, tail_index, buffer_size); + + This returns the number of items currently occupying a buffer[2]. + + + (#) Measure the non-wrapping occupancy of a buffer:: + + CIRC_CNT_TO_END(head_index, tail_index, buffer_size); + + This returns the number of consecutive items[2] that can be extracted from + the buffer without having to wrap back to the beginning of the buffer. + + +Each of these macros will nominally return a value between 0 and buffer_size-1, +however: + + (1) CIRC_SPACE*() are intended to be used in the producer. To the producer + they will return a lower bound as the producer controls the head index, + but the consumer may still be depleting the buffer on another CPU and + moving the tail index. + + To the consumer it will show an upper bound as the producer may be busy + depleting the space. + + (2) CIRC_CNT*() are intended to be used in the consumer. To the consumer they + will return a lower bound as the consumer controls the tail index, but the + producer may still be filling the buffer on another CPU and moving the + head index. + + To the producer it will show an upper bound as the consumer may be busy + emptying the buffer. + + (3) To a third party, the order in which the writes to the indices by the + producer and consumer become visible cannot be guaranteed as they are + independent and may be made on different CPUs - so the result in such a + situation will merely be a guess, and may even be negative. + +Using memory barriers with circular buffers +=========================================== + +By using memory barriers in conjunction with circular buffers, you can avoid +the need to: + + (1) use a single lock to govern access to both ends of the buffer, thus + allowing the buffer to be filled and emptied at the same time; and + + (2) use atomic counter operations. + +There are two sides to this: the producer that fills the buffer, and the +consumer that empties it. Only one thing should be filling a buffer at any one +time, and only one thing should be emptying a buffer at any one time, but the +two sides can operate simultaneously. + + +The producer +------------ + +The producer will look something like this:: + + spin_lock(&producer_lock); + + unsigned long head = buffer->head; + /* The spin_unlock() and next spin_lock() provide needed ordering. */ + unsigned long tail = READ_ONCE(buffer->tail); + + if (CIRC_SPACE(head, tail, buffer->size) >= 1) { + /* insert one item into the buffer */ + struct item *item = buffer[head]; + + produce_item(item); + + smp_store_release(buffer->head, + (head + 1) & (buffer->size - 1)); + + /* wake_up() will make sure that the head is committed before + * waking anyone up */ + wake_up(consumer); + } + + spin_unlock(&producer_lock); + +This will instruct the CPU that the contents of the new item must be written +before the head index makes it available to the consumer and then instructs the +CPU that the revised head index must be written before the consumer is woken. + +Note that wake_up() does not guarantee any sort of barrier unless something +is actually awakened. We therefore cannot rely on it for ordering. However, +there is always one element of the array left empty. Therefore, the +producer must produce two elements before it could possibly corrupt the +element currently being read by the consumer. Therefore, the unlock-lock +pair between consecutive invocations of the consumer provides the necessary +ordering between the read of the index indicating that the consumer has +vacated a given element and the write by the producer to that same element. + + +The Consumer +------------ + +The consumer will look something like this:: + + spin_lock(&consumer_lock); + + /* Read index before reading contents at that index. */ + unsigned long head = smp_load_acquire(buffer->head); + unsigned long tail = buffer->tail; + + if (CIRC_CNT(head, tail, buffer->size) >= 1) { + + /* extract one item from the buffer */ + struct item *item = buffer[tail]; + + consume_item(item); + + /* Finish reading descriptor before incrementing tail. */ + smp_store_release(buffer->tail, + (tail + 1) & (buffer->size - 1)); + } + + spin_unlock(&consumer_lock); + +This will instruct the CPU to make sure the index is up to date before reading +the new item, and then it shall make sure the CPU has finished reading the item +before it writes the new tail pointer, which will erase the item. + +Note the use of READ_ONCE() and smp_load_acquire() to read the +opposition index. This prevents the compiler from discarding and +reloading its cached value. This isn't strictly needed if you can +be sure that the opposition index will _only_ be used the once. +The smp_load_acquire() additionally forces the CPU to order against +subsequent memory references. Similarly, smp_store_release() is used +in both algorithms to write the thread's index. This documents the +fact that we are writing to something that can be read concurrently, +prevents the compiler from tearing the store, and enforces ordering +against previous accesses. + + +Further reading +=============== + +See also Documentation/memory-barriers.txt for a description of Linux's memory +barrier facilities. |