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diff --git a/Documentation/circular-buffers.txt b/Documentation/circular-buffers.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8117e5b --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/circular-buffers.txt @@ -0,0 +1,234 @@ + ================ + CIRCULAR BUFFERS + ================ + +By: David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com> + 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; + unsigned long tail = ACCESS_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_wmb(); /* commit the item before incrementing the head */ + + 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() doesn't have to be the exact mechanism used, but whatever +is used must guarantee a (write) memory barrier between the update of the head +index and the change of state of the consumer, if a change of state occurs. + + +THE CONSUMER +------------ + +The consumer will look something like this: + + spin_lock(&consumer_lock); + + unsigned long head = ACCESS_ONCE(buffer->head); + unsigned long tail = buffer->tail; + + if (CIRC_CNT(head, tail, buffer->size) >= 1) { + /* read index before reading contents at that index */ + smp_read_barrier_depends(); + + /* extract one item from the buffer */ + struct item *item = buffer[tail]; + + consume_item(item); + + smp_mb(); /* finish reading descriptor before incrementing tail */ + + 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 ACCESS_ONCE() in both algorithms to read the opposition index. +This prevents the compiler from discarding and reloading its cached value - +which some compilers will do across smp_read_barrier_depends(). This isn't +strictly needed if you can be sure that the opposition index will _only_ be +used the once. + + +=============== +FURTHER READING +=============== + +See also Documentation/memory-barriers.txt for a description of Linux's memory +barrier facilities. |
