237 lines
11 KiB
Plaintext
237 lines
11 KiB
Plaintext
Using RCU's CPU Stall Detector
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The rcu_cpu_stall_suppress module parameter enables RCU's CPU stall
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detector, which detects conditions that unduly delay RCU grace periods.
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This module parameter enables CPU stall detection by default, but
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may be overridden via boot-time parameter or at runtime via sysfs.
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The stall detector's idea of what constitutes "unduly delayed" is
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controlled by a set of kernel configuration variables and cpp macros:
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CONFIG_RCU_CPU_STALL_TIMEOUT
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This kernel configuration parameter defines the period of time
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that RCU will wait from the beginning of a grace period until it
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issues an RCU CPU stall warning. This time period is normally
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21 seconds.
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This configuration parameter may be changed at runtime via the
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/sys/module/rcutree/parameters/rcu_cpu_stall_timeout, however
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this parameter is checked only at the beginning of a cycle.
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So if you are 10 seconds into a 40-second stall, setting this
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sysfs parameter to (say) five will shorten the timeout for the
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-next- stall, or the following warning for the current stall
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(assuming the stall lasts long enough). It will not affect the
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timing of the next warning for the current stall.
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Stall-warning messages may be enabled and disabled completely via
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/sys/module/rcupdate/parameters/rcu_cpu_stall_suppress.
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CONFIG_RCU_CPU_STALL_INFO
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This kernel configuration parameter causes the stall warning to
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print out additional per-CPU diagnostic information, including
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information on scheduling-clock ticks and RCU's idle-CPU tracking.
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RCU_STALL_DELAY_DELTA
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Although the lockdep facility is extremely useful, it does add
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some overhead. Therefore, under CONFIG_PROVE_RCU, the
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RCU_STALL_DELAY_DELTA macro allows five extra seconds before
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giving an RCU CPU stall warning message. (This is a cpp
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macro, not a kernel configuration parameter.)
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RCU_STALL_RAT_DELAY
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The CPU stall detector tries to make the offending CPU print its
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own warnings, as this often gives better-quality stack traces.
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However, if the offending CPU does not detect its own stall in
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the number of jiffies specified by RCU_STALL_RAT_DELAY, then
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some other CPU will complain. This delay is normally set to
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two jiffies. (This is a cpp macro, not a kernel configuration
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parameter.)
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rcupdate.rcu_task_stall_timeout
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This boot/sysfs parameter controls the RCU-tasks stall warning
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interval. A value of zero or less suppresses RCU-tasks stall
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warnings. A positive value sets the stall-warning interval
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in jiffies. An RCU-tasks stall warning starts wtih the line:
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INFO: rcu_tasks detected stalls on tasks:
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And continues with the output of sched_show_task() for each
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task stalling the current RCU-tasks grace period.
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For non-RCU-tasks flavors of RCU, when a CPU detects that it is stalling,
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it will print a message similar to the following:
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INFO: rcu_sched_state detected stall on CPU 5 (t=2500 jiffies)
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This message indicates that CPU 5 detected that it was causing a stall,
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and that the stall was affecting RCU-sched. This message will normally be
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followed by a stack dump of the offending CPU. On TREE_RCU kernel builds,
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RCU and RCU-sched are implemented by the same underlying mechanism,
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while on PREEMPT_RCU kernel builds, RCU is instead implemented
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by rcu_preempt_state.
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On the other hand, if the offending CPU fails to print out a stall-warning
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message quickly enough, some other CPU will print a message similar to
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the following:
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INFO: rcu_bh_state detected stalls on CPUs/tasks: { 3 5 } (detected by 2, 2502 jiffies)
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This message indicates that CPU 2 detected that CPUs 3 and 5 were both
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causing stalls, and that the stall was affecting RCU-bh. This message
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will normally be followed by stack dumps for each CPU. Please note that
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PREEMPT_RCU builds can be stalled by tasks as well as by CPUs,
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and that the tasks will be indicated by PID, for example, "P3421".
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It is even possible for a rcu_preempt_state stall to be caused by both
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CPUs -and- tasks, in which case the offending CPUs and tasks will all
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be called out in the list.
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Finally, if the grace period ends just as the stall warning starts
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printing, there will be a spurious stall-warning message:
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INFO: rcu_bh_state detected stalls on CPUs/tasks: { } (detected by 4, 2502 jiffies)
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This is rare, but does happen from time to time in real life. It is also
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possible for a zero-jiffy stall to be flagged in this case, depending
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on how the stall warning and the grace-period initialization happen to
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interact. Please note that it is not possible to entirely eliminate this
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sort of false positive without resorting to things like stop_machine(),
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which is overkill for this sort of problem.
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If the CONFIG_RCU_CPU_STALL_INFO kernel configuration parameter is set,
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more information is printed with the stall-warning message, for example:
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INFO: rcu_preempt detected stall on CPU
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0: (63959 ticks this GP) idle=241/3fffffffffffffff/0 softirq=82/543
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(t=65000 jiffies)
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In kernels with CONFIG_RCU_FAST_NO_HZ, even more information is
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printed:
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INFO: rcu_preempt detected stall on CPU
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0: (64628 ticks this GP) idle=dd5/3fffffffffffffff/0 softirq=82/543 last_accelerate: a345/d342 nonlazy_posted: 25 .D
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(t=65000 jiffies)
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The "(64628 ticks this GP)" indicates that this CPU has taken more
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than 64,000 scheduling-clock interrupts during the current stalled
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grace period. If the CPU was not yet aware of the current grace
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period (for example, if it was offline), then this part of the message
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indicates how many grace periods behind the CPU is.
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The "idle=" portion of the message prints the dyntick-idle state.
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The hex number before the first "/" is the low-order 12 bits of the
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dynticks counter, which will have an even-numbered value if the CPU is
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in dyntick-idle mode and an odd-numbered value otherwise. The hex
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number between the two "/"s is the value of the nesting, which will
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be a small positive number if in the idle loop and a very large positive
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number (as shown above) otherwise.
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The "softirq=" portion of the message tracks the number of RCU softirq
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handlers that the stalled CPU has executed. The number before the "/"
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is the number that had executed since boot at the time that this CPU
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last noted the beginning of a grace period, which might be the current
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(stalled) grace period, or it might be some earlier grace period (for
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example, if the CPU might have been in dyntick-idle mode for an extended
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time period. The number after the "/" is the number that have executed
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since boot until the current time. If this latter number stays constant
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across repeated stall-warning messages, it is possible that RCU's softirq
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handlers are no longer able to execute on this CPU. This can happen if
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the stalled CPU is spinning with interrupts are disabled, or, in -rt
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kernels, if a high-priority process is starving RCU's softirq handler.
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For CONFIG_RCU_FAST_NO_HZ kernels, the "last_accelerate:" prints the
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low-order 16 bits (in hex) of the jiffies counter when this CPU last
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invoked rcu_try_advance_all_cbs() from rcu_needs_cpu() or last invoked
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rcu_accelerate_cbs() from rcu_prepare_for_idle(). The "nonlazy_posted:"
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prints the number of non-lazy callbacks posted since the last call to
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rcu_needs_cpu(). Finally, an "L" indicates that there are currently
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no non-lazy callbacks ("." is printed otherwise, as shown above) and
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"D" indicates that dyntick-idle processing is enabled ("." is printed
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otherwise, for example, if disabled via the "nohz=" kernel boot parameter).
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Multiple Warnings From One Stall
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If a stall lasts long enough, multiple stall-warning messages will be
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printed for it. The second and subsequent messages are printed at
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longer intervals, so that the time between (say) the first and second
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message will be about three times the interval between the beginning
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of the stall and the first message.
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What Causes RCU CPU Stall Warnings?
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So your kernel printed an RCU CPU stall warning. The next question is
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"What caused it?" The following problems can result in RCU CPU stall
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warnings:
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o A CPU looping in an RCU read-side critical section.
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o A CPU looping with interrupts disabled. This condition can
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result in RCU-sched and RCU-bh stalls.
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o A CPU looping with preemption disabled. This condition can
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result in RCU-sched stalls and, if ksoftirqd is in use, RCU-bh
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stalls.
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o A CPU looping with bottom halves disabled. This condition can
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result in RCU-sched and RCU-bh stalls.
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o For !CONFIG_PREEMPT kernels, a CPU looping anywhere in the
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kernel without invoking schedule(). Note that cond_resched()
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does not necessarily prevent RCU CPU stall warnings. Therefore,
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if the looping in the kernel is really expected and desirable
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behavior, you might need to replace some of the cond_resched()
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calls with calls to cond_resched_rcu_qs().
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o A CPU-bound real-time task in a CONFIG_PREEMPT kernel, which might
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happen to preempt a low-priority task in the middle of an RCU
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read-side critical section. This is especially damaging if
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that low-priority task is not permitted to run on any other CPU,
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in which case the next RCU grace period can never complete, which
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will eventually cause the system to run out of memory and hang.
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While the system is in the process of running itself out of
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memory, you might see stall-warning messages.
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o A CPU-bound real-time task in a CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT kernel that
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is running at a higher priority than the RCU softirq threads.
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This will prevent RCU callbacks from ever being invoked,
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and in a CONFIG_PREEMPT_RCU kernel will further prevent
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RCU grace periods from ever completing. Either way, the
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system will eventually run out of memory and hang. In the
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CONFIG_PREEMPT_RCU case, you might see stall-warning
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messages.
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o A hardware or software issue shuts off the scheduler-clock
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interrupt on a CPU that is not in dyntick-idle mode. This
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problem really has happened, and seems to be most likely to
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result in RCU CPU stall warnings for CONFIG_NO_HZ_COMMON=n kernels.
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o A bug in the RCU implementation.
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o A hardware failure. This is quite unlikely, but has occurred
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at least once in real life. A CPU failed in a running system,
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becoming unresponsive, but not causing an immediate crash.
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This resulted in a series of RCU CPU stall warnings, eventually
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leading the realization that the CPU had failed.
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The RCU, RCU-sched, RCU-bh, and RCU-tasks implementations have CPU stall
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warning. Note that SRCU does -not- have CPU stall warnings. Please note
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that RCU only detects CPU stalls when there is a grace period in progress.
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No grace period, no CPU stall warnings.
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To diagnose the cause of the stall, inspect the stack traces.
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The offending function will usually be near the top of the stack.
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If you have a series of stall warnings from a single extended stall,
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comparing the stack traces can often help determine where the stall
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is occurring, which will usually be in the function nearest the top of
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that portion of the stack which remains the same from trace to trace.
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If you can reliably trigger the stall, ftrace can be quite helpful.
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RCU bugs can often be debugged with the help of CONFIG_RCU_TRACE
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and with RCU's event tracing. For information on RCU's event tracing,
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see include/trace/events/rcu.h.
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