llvm/docs/HistoricalNotes/2003-06-25-Reoptimizer1.txt - toolchain/llvm-project - Gitiles

 Wed Jun 25 15:13:51 CDT 2003

 First-level instrumentation
 ---------------------------

 We use opt to do Bytecode-to-bytecode instrumentation. Look at
 back-edges and insert llvm_first_trigger() function call which takes
 no arguments and no return value. This instrumentation is designed to
 be easy to remove, for instance by writing a NOP over the function
 call instruction.

 Keep count of every call to llvm_first_trigger(), and maintain
 counters in a map indexed by return address. If the trigger count
 exceeds a threshold, we identify a hot loop and perform second-level
 instrumentation on the hot loop region (the instructions between the
 target of the back-edge and the branch that causes the back-edge).  We
 do not move code across basic-block boundaries.


 Second-level instrumentation
 ---------------------------

 We remove the first-level instrumentation by overwriting the CALL to
 llvm_first_trigger() with a NOP.

 The reoptimizer maintains a map between machine-code basic blocks and
 LLVM BasicBlock*s.  We only keep track of paths that start at the
 first machine-code basic block of the hot loop region.

 How do we keep track of which edges to instrument, and which edges are
 exits from the hot region? 3 step process.

 1) Do a DFS from the first machine-code basic block of the hot loop
 region and mark reachable edges.

 2) Do a DFS from the last machine-code basic block of the hot loop
 region IGNORING back edges, and mark the edges which are reachable in
 1) and also in 2) (i.e., must be reachable from both the start BB and
 the end BB of the hot region).

 3) Mark BBs which end in edges that exit the hot region; we need to
 instrument these differently.

 Assume that there is 1 free register. On SPARC we use %g1, which LLC
 has agreed not to use.  Shift a 1 into it at the beginning. At every
 edge which corresponds to a conditional branch, we shift 0 for not
 taken and 1 for taken into a register. This uniquely numbers the paths
 through the hot region. Silently fail if we need more than 64 bits.

 At the end BB we call countPath and increment the counter based on %g1
 and the return address of the countPath call.  We keep track of the
 number of iterations and the number of paths.  We only run this
 version 30 or 40 times.

 Find the BBs that total 90% or more of execution, and aggregate them
 together to form our trace. But we do not allow more than 5 paths; if
 we have more than 5 we take the ones that are executed the most.  We
 verify our assumption that we picked a hot back-edge in first-level
 instrumentation, by making sure that the number of times we took an
 exit edge from the hot trace is less than 10% of the number of
 iterations.

 LLC has been taught to recognize llvm_first_trigger() calls and NOT
 generate saves and restores of caller-saved registers around these
 calls.


 Phase behavior
 --------------

 We turn off llvm_first_trigger() calls with NOPs, but this would hide
 phase behavior from us (when some funcs/traces stop being hot and
 others become hot.)

 We have a SIGALRM timer that counts time for us. Every time we get a
 SIGALRM we look at our priority queue of locations where we have
 removed llvm_first_trigger() calls. Each location is inserted along
 with a time when we will next turn instrumentation back on for that
 call site. If the time has arrived for a particular call site, we pop
 that off the prio. queue and turn instrumentation back on for that
 call site.


 Generating traces
 -----------------

 When we finally generate an optimized trace we first copy the code
 into the trace cache. This leaves us with 3 copies of the code: the
 original code, the instrumented code, and the optimized trace. The
 optimized trace does not have instrumentation. The original code and
 the instrumented code are modified to have a branch to the trace
 cache, where the optimized traces are kept.

 We copy the code from the original to the instrumentation version
 by tracing the LLVM-to-Machine code basic block map and then copying
 each machine code basic block we think is in the hot region into the
 trace cache. Then we instrument that code. The process is similar for
 generating the final optimized trace; we copy the same basic blocks
 because we might need to put in fixup code for exit BBs.

 LLVM basic blocks are not typically used in the Reoptimizer except
 for the mapping information.

 We are restricted to using single instructions to branch between the
 original code, trace, and instrumented code. So we have to keep the
 code copies in memory near the original code (they can't be far enough
 away that a single pc-relative branch would not work.) Malloc() or
 data region space is too far away. this impacts the design of the
 trace cache.

 We use a dummy function that is full of a bunch of for loops which we
 overwrite with trace-cache code. The trace manager keeps track of
 whether or not we have enough space in the trace cache, etc.

 The trace insertion routine takes an original start address, a vector
 of machine instructions representing the trace, index of branches and
 their corresponding absolute targets, and index of calls and their
 corresponding absolute targets.

 The trace insertion routine is responsible for inserting branches from
 the beginning of the original code to the beginning of the optimized
 trace. This is because at some point the trace cache may run out of
 space and it may have to evict a trace, at which point the branch to
 the trace would also have to be removed. It uses a round-robin
 replacement policy; we have found that this is almost as good as LRU
 and better than random (especially because of problems fitting the new
 trace in.)

 We cannot deal with discontiguous trace cache areas.  The trace cache
 is supposed to be cache-line-aligned, but it is not page-aligned.

 We generate instrumentation traces and optimized traces into separate
 trace caches. We keep the instrumented code around because you don't
 want to delete a trace when you still might have to return to it
 (i.e., return from a llvm_first_trigger() or countPath() call.)
	Wed Jun 25 15:13:51 CDT 2003

	First-level instrumentation
	---------------------------

	We use opt to do Bytecode-to-bytecode instrumentation. Look at
	back-edges and insert llvm_first_trigger() function call which takes
	no arguments and no return value. This instrumentation is designed to
	be easy to remove, for instance by writing a NOP over the function
	call instruction.

	Keep count of every call to llvm_first_trigger(), and maintain
	counters in a map indexed by return address. If the trigger count
	exceeds a threshold, we identify a hot loop and perform second-level
	instrumentation on the hot loop region (the instructions between the
	target of the back-edge and the branch that causes the back-edge). We
	do not move code across basic-block boundaries.


	Second-level instrumentation
	---------------------------

	We remove the first-level instrumentation by overwriting the CALL to
	llvm_first_trigger() with a NOP.

	The reoptimizer maintains a map between machine-code basic blocks and
	LLVM BasicBlock*s. We only keep track of paths that start at the
	first machine-code basic block of the hot loop region.

	How do we keep track of which edges to instrument, and which edges are
	exits from the hot region? 3 step process.

	1) Do a DFS from the first machine-code basic block of the hot loop
	region and mark reachable edges.

	2) Do a DFS from the last machine-code basic block of the hot loop
	region IGNORING back edges, and mark the edges which are reachable in
	1) and also in 2) (i.e., must be reachable from both the start BB and
	the end BB of the hot region).

	3) Mark BBs which end in edges that exit the hot region; we need to
	instrument these differently.

	Assume that there is 1 free register. On SPARC we use %g1, which LLC
	has agreed not to use. Shift a 1 into it at the beginning. At every
	edge which corresponds to a conditional branch, we shift 0 for not
	taken and 1 for taken into a register. This uniquely numbers the paths
	through the hot region. Silently fail if we need more than 64 bits.

	At the end BB we call countPath and increment the counter based on %g1
	and the return address of the countPath call. We keep track of the
	number of iterations and the number of paths. We only run this
	version 30 or 40 times.

	Find the BBs that total 90% or more of execution, and aggregate them
	together to form our trace. But we do not allow more than 5 paths; if
	we have more than 5 we take the ones that are executed the most. We
	verify our assumption that we picked a hot back-edge in first-level
	instrumentation, by making sure that the number of times we took an
	exit edge from the hot trace is less than 10% of the number of
	iterations.

	LLC has been taught to recognize llvm_first_trigger() calls and NOT
	generate saves and restores of caller-saved registers around these
	calls.


	Phase behavior
	--------------

	We turn off llvm_first_trigger() calls with NOPs, but this would hide
	phase behavior from us (when some funcs/traces stop being hot and
	others become hot.)

	We have a SIGALRM timer that counts time for us. Every time we get a
	SIGALRM we look at our priority queue of locations where we have
	removed llvm_first_trigger() calls. Each location is inserted along
	with a time when we will next turn instrumentation back on for that
	call site. If the time has arrived for a particular call site, we pop
	that off the prio. queue and turn instrumentation back on for that
	call site.


	Generating traces
	-----------------

	When we finally generate an optimized trace we first copy the code
	into the trace cache. This leaves us with 3 copies of the code: the
	original code, the instrumented code, and the optimized trace. The
	optimized trace does not have instrumentation. The original code and
	the instrumented code are modified to have a branch to the trace
	cache, where the optimized traces are kept.

	We copy the code from the original to the instrumentation version
	by tracing the LLVM-to-Machine code basic block map and then copying
	each machine code basic block we think is in the hot region into the
	trace cache. Then we instrument that code. The process is similar for
	generating the final optimized trace; we copy the same basic blocks
	because we might need to put in fixup code for exit BBs.

	LLVM basic blocks are not typically used in the Reoptimizer except
	for the mapping information.

	We are restricted to using single instructions to branch between the
	original code, trace, and instrumented code. So we have to keep the
	code copies in memory near the original code (they can't be far enough
	away that a single pc-relative branch would not work.) Malloc() or
	data region space is too far away. this impacts the design of the
	trace cache.

	We use a dummy function that is full of a bunch of for loops which we
	overwrite with trace-cache code. The trace manager keeps track of
	whether or not we have enough space in the trace cache, etc.

	The trace insertion routine takes an original start address, a vector
	of machine instructions representing the trace, index of branches and
	their corresponding absolute targets, and index of calls and their
	corresponding absolute targets.

	The trace insertion routine is responsible for inserting branches from
	the beginning of the original code to the beginning of the optimized
	trace. This is because at some point the trace cache may run out of
	space and it may have to evict a trace, at which point the branch to
	the trace would also have to be removed. It uses a round-robin
	replacement policy; we have found that this is almost as good as LRU
	and better than random (especially because of problems fitting the new
	trace in.)

	We cannot deal with discontiguous trace cache areas. The trace cache
	is supposed to be cache-line-aligned, but it is not page-aligned.

	We generate instrumentation traces and optimized traces into separate
	trace caches. We keep the instrumented code around because you don't
	want to delete a trace when you still might have to return to it
	(i.e., return from a llvm_first_trigger() or countPath() call.)