Files
linux/tools/include/uapi
Bobby Eshleman b27a8560ee net: devmem: allow rx-page-size > PAGE_SIZE per dmabuf binding
Every devmem dmabuf binding today hands the page_pool PAGE_SIZE niovs.
This caps a single RX descriptor at PAGE_SIZE, burning CPU on buffer
churn for large flows.

Add a bind-time netlink attribute, NETDEV_A_DMABUF_RX_PAGE_SIZE, that
lets userspace request a larger niov size. The value must be a power of
two >= PAGE_SIZE.

The TX path is changed to always pass PAGE_SIZE.

Measurements:
Setup: kperf in devmem RX/TX cuda mode, 4 flows, 64 MB messages, 60s,
dctcp, num-rx-queues=4, dmabuf-rx/tx-size-mb=2048, 10 runs per niov
size, mlx5.

CPU Util:

   niov        net sirq %        net idle %         app sys %        app idle %
  -----  ----------------  ----------------  ----------------  ----------------
     4K   62.38 +/-  8.27   33.40 +/-  7.51   54.15 +/- 10.23   43.67 +/- 10.53
    16K   58.91 +/-  5.35   35.23 +/-  5.88   41.05 +/-  8.87   56.42 +/-  9.24
    32K   64.12 +/-  0.68   31.09 +/-  1.48   44.54 +/-  3.51   52.63 +/-  3.65
    64K   54.69 +/-  5.54   39.67 +/-  5.81   35.47 +/-  3.11   61.97 +/-  3.27

RX app sys % drops ~19% from 4K to 64K.

Throughput:

   niov       RX dev Gbps   RX flow avg Gbps
  -----  ----------------  -----------------
     4K  300.63 +/- 53.21    75.16 +/- 13.30
    16K  321.35 +/- 28.20    80.34 +/-  7.05
    32K  347.63 +/-  2.20    86.91 +/-  0.55
    64K  332.11 +/- 14.26    83.03 +/-  3.56

Throughput seems to increase, but the stdev is pretty wide so could just
be noise.

kperf support (not yet merged):
8837577f92

Acked-by: Stanislav Fomichev <sdf@fomichev.me>
Reviewed-by: Mina Almasry <almasrymina@google.com>
Reviewed-by: Nikolay Aleksandrov <razor@blackwall.org>
Signed-off-by: Bobby Eshleman <bobbyeshleman@meta.com>
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260805-tcpdm-large-niovs-v8-1-3e0225e2808c@meta.com
Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
2026-08-07 18:32:39 -07:00
..

Why we want a copy of kernel headers in tools?
==============================================

There used to be no copies, with tools/ code using kernel headers
directly. From time to time tools/perf/ broke due to legitimate kernel
hacking. At some point Linus complained about such direct usage. Then we
adopted the current model.

The way these headers are used in perf are not restricted to just
including them to compile something.

There are sometimes used in scripts that convert defines into string
tables, etc, so some change may break one of these scripts, or new MSRs
may use some different #define pattern, etc.

E.g.:

  $ ls -1 tools/perf/trace/beauty/*.sh | head -5
  tools/perf/trace/beauty/arch_errno_names.sh
  tools/perf/trace/beauty/drm_ioctl.sh
  tools/perf/trace/beauty/fadvise.sh
  tools/perf/trace/beauty/fsconfig.sh
  tools/perf/trace/beauty/fsmount.sh
  $
  $ tools/perf/trace/beauty/fadvise.sh
  static const char *fadvise_advices[] = {
        [0] = "NORMAL",
        [1] = "RANDOM",
        [2] = "SEQUENTIAL",
        [3] = "WILLNEED",
        [4] = "DONTNEED",
        [5] = "NOREUSE",
  };
  $

The tools/perf/check-headers.sh script, part of the tools/ build
process, points out changes in the original files.

So its important not to touch the copies in tools/ when doing changes in
the original kernel headers, that will be done later, when
check-headers.sh inform about the change to the perf tools hackers.

Another explanation from Ingo Molnar:
It's better than all the alternatives we tried so far:

 - Symbolic links and direct #includes: this was the original approach but
   was pushed back on from the kernel side, when tooling modified the
   headers and broke them accidentally for kernel builds.

 - Duplicate self-defined ABI headers like glibc: double the maintenance
   burden, double the chance for mistakes, plus there's no tech-driven
   notification mechanism to look at new kernel side changes.

What we are doing now is a third option:

 - A software-enforced copy-on-write mechanism of kernel headers to
   tooling, driven by non-fatal warnings on the tooling side build when
   kernel headers get modified:

    Warning: Kernel ABI header differences:
      diff -u tools/include/uapi/drm/i915_drm.h include/uapi/drm/i915_drm.h
      diff -u tools/include/uapi/linux/fs.h include/uapi/linux/fs.h
      diff -u tools/include/uapi/linux/kvm.h include/uapi/linux/kvm.h
      ...

   The tooling policy is to always pick up the kernel side headers as-is,
   and integate them into the tooling build. The warnings above serve as a
   notification to tooling maintainers that there's changes on the kernel
   side.

We've been using this for many years now, and it might seem hacky, but
works surprisingly well.