[PATCH] ucc_geth: Move freeing of TX packets to NAPI context.

[Li Yang]

On Mon, Mar 30, 2009 at 5:21 PM, Joakim Tjernlund
<Joakim.Tjernlund at transmode.se> wrote:
> pku.leo at gmail.com wrote on 30/03/2009 10:34:47:
>>
>> On Thu, Mar 26, 2009 at 1:51 AM, Joakim Tjernlund
>> <Joakim.Tjernlund at transmode.se> wrote:
>> > Anton Vorontsov <avorontsov at ru.mvista.com> wrote on 25/03/2009
> 15:25:40:
>> >> On Wed, Mar 25, 2009 at 02:30:49PM +0100, Joakim Tjernlund wrote:
>> >> > >>From 1c2f23b1f37f4818c0fd0217b93eb38ab6564840 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00
>> > 2001
>> >> > From: Joakim Tjernlund <Joakim.Tjernlund at transmode.se>
>> >> > Date: Tue, 24 Mar 2009 10:19:27 +0100
>> >> > Subject: [PATCH] ucc_geth: Move freeing of TX packets to NAPI
> context.
>> >> >  Also increase NAPI weight somewhat.
>> >> >  This will make the system alot more responsive while
>> >> >  ping flooding the ucc_geth ethernet interaface.
>> >>
>> >> Some time ago I've tried a similar thing for this driver, but during
>> >> tcp (or udp I don't quite remember) netperf tests I was getting tx
>> >> watchdog timeouts after ~2-5 minutes of work. I was testing with a
>> >> gigabit and 100 Mbit link, with 100 Mbit link the issue was not
>> >> reproducible.
>> >>
>> >> Though, I recalling I was doing a bit more than your patch: I was
>> >> also clearing the TX events in the ucce register before calling
>> >> ucc_geth_tx, that way I was trying to avoid stale interrupts. That
>> >> helped to increase an overall performance (not only responsiveness),
>> >> but as I said my approach didn't pass the tests.
>> >>
>> >> I don't really think that your patch may cause this, but can you
>> >> try netperf w/ this patch applied anyway? And see if it really
>> >> doesn't cause any issues under stress?
>> >
>> > Does the line(in ucc_geth_tx()) look OK to you:
>> >        if ((bd == ugeth->txBd[txQ]) && (netif_queue_stopped(dev) ==
> 0))
>> >                        break;
>> >
>> > Sure does look fishy to me.
>>
>> There are two cases when txBd=ConfBd: the BD ring is full or empty.
>> The condition used here ensures that it is the empty case.  Because in
>> hard_start_xmit, the queue will be stopped when the BD ring is full.
>> Maybe some comment is needed here.
>
> But how do you know that the queue hasn't been stopped by someone else
> than
> the driver?
> If it is stopped by higher layers, the if stmt will fail.

It looks like from existing code that only the driver can legally stop
the queue.  I'm not 100% sure though.  Correct me if I'm wrong.

- Leo