refperf: Add a test to measure performance of read-side synchronization

Add a test for comparing the performance of RCU with various read-side
synchronization mechanisms. The test has proved useful for collecting
data and performing these comparisons.

Currently RCU, SRCU, reader-writer lock, reader-writer semaphore and
reference counting can be measured using refperf.perf_type parameter.
Each invocation of the test runs measures performance of a specific
mechanism.

The maximum number of CPUs to concurrently run readers on is chosen by
the test itself and is 75% of the total number of CPUs. So if you had 24
CPUs, the test runs with a maximum of 18 parallel readers.

A number of experiments are conducted, and in each experiment, the
number of readers is increased by 1, upto the 75% of CPUs mark. During
each experiment, all readers execute an empty loop with refperf.loops
iterations and time the total loop duration. This is then averaged.

Example output:
Parameters "refperf.perf_type=srcu refperf.loops=2000000" looks like:

[    3.347133] srcu-ref-perf:
[    3.347133] Threads  Time(ns)
[    3.347133] 1        36
[    3.347133] 2        34
[    3.347133] 3        34
[    3.347133] 4        34
[    3.347133] 5        33
[    3.347133] 6        33
[    3.347133] 7        33
[    3.347133] 8        33
[    3.347133] 9        33
[    3.347133] 10       33
[    3.347133] 11       33
[    3.347133] 12       33
[    3.347133] 13       33
[    3.347133] 14       33
[    3.347133] 15       32
[    3.347133] 16       33
[    3.347133] 17       33
[    3.347133] 18       34

Signed-off-by: Joel Fernandes (Google) <joel@joelfernandes.org>
Signed-off-by: Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@kernel.org>

1 files changed, 19 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/kernel/rcu/Kconfig.debug b/kernel/rcu/Kconfig.debug
index 452feae8de20..858765b7f644 100644
--- a/kernel/rcu/Kconfig.debug
+++ b/kernel/rcu/Kconfig.debug
@@ -61,6 +61,25 @@ config RCU_TORTURE_TEST
 	  Say M if you want the RCU torture tests to build as a module.
 	  Say N if you are unsure.
 
+config RCU_REF_PERF_TEST
+	tristate "Performance tests for read-side synchronization (RCU and others)"
+	depends on DEBUG_KERNEL
+	select TORTURE_TEST
+	select SRCU
+	select TASKS_RCU
+	select TASKS_RUDE_RCU
+	select TASKS_TRACE_RCU
+	default n
+	help
+	  This option provides a kernel module that runs performance tests
+	  useful comparing RCU with various read-side synchronization mechanisms.
+	  The kernel module may be built after the fact on the running kernel to be
+	  tested, if desired.
+
+	  Say Y here if you want these performance tests built into the kernel.
+	  Say M if you want to build it as a module instead.
+	  Say N if you are unsure.
+
 config RCU_CPU_STALL_TIMEOUT
 	int "RCU CPU stall timeout in seconds"
 	depends on RCU_STALL_COMMON