WARNING - OLD ARCHIVES

This is an archived copy of the Xen.org mailing list, which we have preserved to ensure that existing links to archives are not broken. The live archive, which contains the latest emails, can be found at http://lists.xen.org/
   
 
 
Xen 
 
Home Products Support Community News
 
   
 

xen-devel

RE: [Xen-devel] [PATCH]RFC: VGA accleration using shadow PTE D-bit to co

To: "Huang, Xinmei" <xinmei.huang@xxxxxxxxx>, "Ian Pratt" <Ian.Pratt@xxxxxxxxxxxx>, "Tim Deegan" <Tim.Deegan@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: RE: [Xen-devel] [PATCH]RFC: VGA accleration using shadow PTE D-bit to construct LFB dirty bitmap
From: "Ian Pratt" <Ian.Pratt@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 31 Jul 2007 08:38:07 +0100
Cc: xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Delivery-date: Tue, 31 Jul 2007 00:37:02 -0700
Envelope-to: www-data@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
List-help: <mailto:xen-devel-request@lists.xensource.com?subject=help>
List-id: Xen developer discussion <xen-devel.lists.xensource.com>
List-post: <mailto:xen-devel@lists.xensource.com>
List-subscribe: <http://lists.xensource.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xen-devel>, <mailto:xen-devel-request@lists.xensource.com?subject=subscribe>
List-unsubscribe: <http://lists.xensource.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xen-devel>, <mailto:xen-devel-request@lists.xensource.com?subject=unsubscribe>
References: <823A93EED437D048963A3697DB0E35DE8D115F@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sender: xen-devel-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Thread-index: AcfSmPsmUkkzcSUoTieZ2E28u26g3AAB9oggAB2bUYAAC2QXMA==
Thread-topic: [Xen-devel] [PATCH]RFC: VGA accleration using shadow PTE D-bit to construct LFB dirty bitmap
> >We can use missing shadows as an optimization: if we return a bit map
> >with 'everything clean' a few times in a row, we are probably
> >better off
> >pro-actively unshadowing the page to avoid even doing the dirty bit
> >scanning.
> 
> Unshadowing & re-shadowing the all LFB pages are expensive.
> Performance would vary because the characteristic of graphic-intensive
> workload and the value of N -- the times of continuous 'all-clean'.
> I'm not sure this brings suffient benefit.

It's not that expensive, and it would be good to avoid the scanning
altogether for a screen that is updating very rarely (e.g. screen
blanker enabled). You could leave the shadows in place but write protect
the entries in the L2. However, since the shadows are liable to get
evicted in that scenario anyhow it may be an unnecessary complexity.

Ian

_______________________________________________
Xen-devel mailing list
Xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel