diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'xorg-server/doc/smartsched')
-rw-r--r-- | xorg-server/doc/smartsched | 408 |
1 files changed, 204 insertions, 204 deletions
diff --git a/xorg-server/doc/smartsched b/xorg-server/doc/smartsched index 466408431..057a759fd 100644 --- a/xorg-server/doc/smartsched +++ b/xorg-server/doc/smartsched @@ -1,204 +1,204 @@ - Client Scheduling in X
- Keith Packard
- SuSE
- 10/28/99
-
-History:
-
-Since the original X server was written at Digital in 1987, the OS and DIX
-layers shared responsibility for scheduling the order to service
-client requests. The original design was simplistic; under the maximum
-first make it work, then make it work well, this was a good idea. Now
-that we have a bit more experience with X applications, it's time to
-rethink the design.
-
-The basic dispatch loop in DIX looks like:
-
- for (;;)
- {
- nready = WaitForSomething (...);
- while (nready--)
- {
- isItTimeToYield = FALSE;
- while (!isItTimeToYield)
- {
- if (!ReadRequestFromClient (...))
- break;
- (execute request);
- }
- }
- }
-
-WaitForSomething looks like:
-
- for (;;)
- if (ANYSET (ClientsWithInput))
- return popcount (ClientsWithInput);
- select (...)
- compute clientsReadable from select result;
- return popcount (clientsReadable)
- }
-
-ReadRequestFromClient looks like:
-
- if (!fullRequestQueued)
- {
- read ();
- if (!fullRequestQueued)
- {
- remove from ClientsWithInput;
- timesThisConnection = 0;
- return 0;
- }
- }
- if (twoFullRequestsQueued)
- add to ClientsWithInput;
-
- if (++timesThisConnection >= 10)
- {
- isItTimeToYield = TRUE;
- timesThisConnection = 0;
- }
- return 1;
-
-Here's what happens in this code:
-
-With a single client executing a stream of requests:
-
- A client sends a packet of requests to the server.
-
- WaitForSomething wakes up from select and returns that client
- to Dispatch
-
- Dispatch calls ReadRequestFromClient which reads a buffer (4K)
- full of requests from the client
-
- The server executes requests from this buffer until it emptys,
- in two stages -- 10 requests at a time are executed in the
- inner Dispatch loop, a buffer full of requests are executed
- because WaitForSomething immediately returns if any clients
- have complete requests pending in their input queues.
-
- When the buffer finally emptys, the next call to ReadRequest
- FromClient will return zero and Dispatch will go back to
- WaitForSomething; now that the client has no requests pending,
- WaitForSomething will block in select again. If the client
- is active, this select will immediately return that client
- as ready to read.
-
-With multiple clients sending streams of requests, the sequence
-of operations is similar, except that ReadRequestFromClient will
-set isItTimeToYield after each 10 requests executed causing the
-server to round-robin among the clients with available requests.
-
-It's important to realize here that any complete requests which have been
-read from clients will be executed before the server will use select again
-to discover input from other clients. A single busy client can easily
-monopolize the X server.
-
-So, the X server doesn't share well with clients which are more interactive
-in nature.
-
-The X server executes at most a buffer full of requests before again heading
-into select; ReadRequestFromClient causes the server to yield when the
-client request buffer doesn't contain a complete request. When
-that buffer is executed quickly, the server spends a lot of time
-in select discovering that the same client again has input ready. Thus
-the server also runs busy clients less efficiently than is would be
-possible.
-
-What to do.
-
-There are several things evident from the above discussion:
-
- 1 The server has a poor metric for deciding how much work it
- should do at one time on behalf of a particular client.
-
- 2 The server doesn't call select often enough to detect less
- aggressive clients in the face of busy clients, especially
- when those clients are executing slow requests.
-
- 3 The server calls select too often when executing fast requests.
-
- 4 Some priority scheme is needed to keep interactive clients
- responding to the user.
-
-And, there are some assumptions about how X applications work:
-
- 1 Each X request is executed relatively quickly; a request-granularity
- is good enough for interactive response almost all of the time.
-
- 2 X applications receiving mouse/keyboard events are likely to
- warrant additional attention from the X server.
-
-Instead of a request-count metric for work, a time-based metric should be
-used. The server should select a reasonable time slice for each client
-and execute requests for the entire timeslice before yielding to
-another client.
-
-Instead of returning immediately from WaitForSomething if clients have
-complete requests queued, the server should go through select each
-time and gather as many ready clients as possible. This involves
-polling instead of blocking and adding the ClientsWithInput to
-clientsReadable after the select returns.
-
-Instead of yielding when the request buffer is empty for a particular
-client, leave the yielding to the upper level scheduling and allow
-the server to try and read again from the socket. If the client
-is busy, another buffer full of requests will already be waiting
-to be delivered thus avoiding the call through select and the
-additional overhead in WaitForSomething.
-
-Finally, the dispatch loop should not simply execute requests from the
-first available client, instead each client should be prioritized with
-busy clients penalized and clients receiving user events praised.
-
-How it's done:
-
-Polling the current time of day from the OS is too expensive to
-be done at each request boundary, so instead an interval timer is
-set allowing the server to track time changes by counting invocations
-of the related signal handler. Instead of using the wall time for
-this purpose, the process CPU time is used instead. This serves
-two purposes -- first, it allows the server to consume no CPU cycles
-when idle, second it avoids conflicts with SIGALRM usage in other
-parts of the server code. It's not without problems though; other
-CPU intensive processes on the same machine can reduce interactive
-response time within the X server. The dispatch loop can now
-calculate an approximate time value using the number of signals
-received. The granularity of the timer sets the scheduling jitter,
-at 20ms it's only occasionally noticeable.
-
-The changes to WaitForSomething and ReadRequestFromClient are
-straightforward, adjusting when select is called and avoiding
-setting isItTimeToYield too often.
-
-The dispatch loop changes are more extensive, now instead of
-executing requests from all available clients, a single client
-is chosen after each call to WaitForSomething, requests are
-executed for that client and WaitForSomething is called again.
-
-Each client is assigned a priority, the dispatch loop chooses the
-client with the highest priority to execute. Priorities are
-updated in three ways:
-
- 1. Clients which consume their entire slice are penalized
- by having their priority reduced by one until they
- reach some minimum value.
-
- 2. Clients which have executed no requests for some time
- are praised by having their priority raised until they
- return to normal priority.
-
- 3. Clients which receive user input are praised by having
- their priority rased until they reach some maximal
- value, above normal priority.
-
-The effect of these changes is to both improve interactive application
-response and benchmark numbers at the same time.
-
-
-
-
-
-$XFree86: $
+ Client Scheduling in X + Keith Packard + SuSE + 10/28/99 + +History: + +Since the original X server was written at Digital in 1987, the OS and DIX +layers shared responsibility for scheduling the order to service +client requests. The original design was simplistic; under the maximum +first make it work, then make it work well, this was a good idea. Now +that we have a bit more experience with X applications, it's time to +rethink the design. + +The basic dispatch loop in DIX looks like: + + for (;;) + { + nready = WaitForSomething (...); + while (nready--) + { + isItTimeToYield = FALSE; + while (!isItTimeToYield) + { + if (!ReadRequestFromClient (...)) + break; + (execute request); + } + } + } + +WaitForSomething looks like: + + for (;;) + if (ANYSET (ClientsWithInput)) + return popcount (ClientsWithInput); + select (...) + compute clientsReadable from select result; + return popcount (clientsReadable) + } + +ReadRequestFromClient looks like: + + if (!fullRequestQueued) + { + read (); + if (!fullRequestQueued) + { + remove from ClientsWithInput; + timesThisConnection = 0; + return 0; + } + } + if (twoFullRequestsQueued) + add to ClientsWithInput; + + if (++timesThisConnection >= 10) + { + isItTimeToYield = TRUE; + timesThisConnection = 0; + } + return 1; + +Here's what happens in this code: + +With a single client executing a stream of requests: + + A client sends a packet of requests to the server. + + WaitForSomething wakes up from select and returns that client + to Dispatch + + Dispatch calls ReadRequestFromClient which reads a buffer (4K) + full of requests from the client + + The server executes requests from this buffer until it emptys, + in two stages -- 10 requests at a time are executed in the + inner Dispatch loop, a buffer full of requests are executed + because WaitForSomething immediately returns if any clients + have complete requests pending in their input queues. + + When the buffer finally emptys, the next call to ReadRequest + FromClient will return zero and Dispatch will go back to + WaitForSomething; now that the client has no requests pending, + WaitForSomething will block in select again. If the client + is active, this select will immediately return that client + as ready to read. + +With multiple clients sending streams of requests, the sequence +of operations is similar, except that ReadRequestFromClient will +set isItTimeToYield after each 10 requests executed causing the +server to round-robin among the clients with available requests. + +It's important to realize here that any complete requests which have been +read from clients will be executed before the server will use select again +to discover input from other clients. A single busy client can easily +monopolize the X server. + +So, the X server doesn't share well with clients which are more interactive +in nature. + +The X server executes at most a buffer full of requests before again heading +into select; ReadRequestFromClient causes the server to yield when the +client request buffer doesn't contain a complete request. When +that buffer is executed quickly, the server spends a lot of time +in select discovering that the same client again has input ready. Thus +the server also runs busy clients less efficiently than is would be +possible. + +What to do. + +There are several things evident from the above discussion: + + 1 The server has a poor metric for deciding how much work it + should do at one time on behalf of a particular client. + + 2 The server doesn't call select often enough to detect less + aggressive clients in the face of busy clients, especially + when those clients are executing slow requests. + + 3 The server calls select too often when executing fast requests. + + 4 Some priority scheme is needed to keep interactive clients + responding to the user. + +And, there are some assumptions about how X applications work: + + 1 Each X request is executed relatively quickly; a request-granularity + is good enough for interactive response almost all of the time. + + 2 X applications receiving mouse/keyboard events are likely to + warrant additional attention from the X server. + +Instead of a request-count metric for work, a time-based metric should be +used. The server should select a reasonable time slice for each client +and execute requests for the entire timeslice before yielding to +another client. + +Instead of returning immediately from WaitForSomething if clients have +complete requests queued, the server should go through select each +time and gather as many ready clients as possible. This involves +polling instead of blocking and adding the ClientsWithInput to +clientsReadable after the select returns. + +Instead of yielding when the request buffer is empty for a particular +client, leave the yielding to the upper level scheduling and allow +the server to try and read again from the socket. If the client +is busy, another buffer full of requests will already be waiting +to be delivered thus avoiding the call through select and the +additional overhead in WaitForSomething. + +Finally, the dispatch loop should not simply execute requests from the +first available client, instead each client should be prioritized with +busy clients penalized and clients receiving user events praised. + +How it's done: + +Polling the current time of day from the OS is too expensive to +be done at each request boundary, so instead an interval timer is +set allowing the server to track time changes by counting invocations +of the related signal handler. Instead of using the wall time for +this purpose, the process CPU time is used instead. This serves +two purposes -- first, it allows the server to consume no CPU cycles +when idle, second it avoids conflicts with SIGALRM usage in other +parts of the server code. It's not without problems though; other +CPU intensive processes on the same machine can reduce interactive +response time within the X server. The dispatch loop can now +calculate an approximate time value using the number of signals +received. The granularity of the timer sets the scheduling jitter, +at 20ms it's only occasionally noticeable. + +The changes to WaitForSomething and ReadRequestFromClient are +straightforward, adjusting when select is called and avoiding +setting isItTimeToYield too often. + +The dispatch loop changes are more extensive, now instead of +executing requests from all available clients, a single client +is chosen after each call to WaitForSomething, requests are +executed for that client and WaitForSomething is called again. + +Each client is assigned a priority, the dispatch loop chooses the +client with the highest priority to execute. Priorities are +updated in three ways: + + 1. Clients which consume their entire slice are penalized + by having their priority reduced by one until they + reach some minimum value. + + 2. Clients which have executed no requests for some time + are praised by having their priority raised until they + return to normal priority. + + 3. Clients which receive user input are praised by having + their priority rased until they reach some maximal + value, above normal priority. + +The effect of these changes is to both improve interactive application +response and benchmark numbers at the same time. + + + + + +$XFree86: $ |