linux-phytec-fsl

cpufreq: Make sure frequency transitions are serialized

Whenever we change the frequency of a CPU, we call the PRECHANGE and POSTCHANGE
notifiers. They must be serialized, i.e. PRECHANGE and POSTCHANGE notifiers
should strictly alternate, thereby preventing two different sets of PRECHANGE or
POSTCHANGE notifiers from interleaving arbitrarily.

The following examples illustrate why this is important:

Scenario 1:
-----------
A thread reading the value of cpuinfo_cur_freq, will call
__cpufreq_cpu_get()->cpufreq_out_of_sync()->cpufreq_notify_transition()

The ondemand governor can decide to change the frequency of the CPU at the same
time and hence it can end up sending the notifications via ->target().

If the notifiers are not serialized, the following sequence can occur:
- PRECHANGE Notification for freq A (from cpuinfo_cur_freq)
- PRECHANGE Notification for freq B (from target())
- Freq changed by target() to B
- POSTCHANGE Notification for freq B
- POSTCHANGE Notification for freq A

We can see from the above that the last POSTCHANGE Notification happens for freq
A but the hardware is set to run at freq B.

Where would we break then?: adjust_jiffies() in cpufreq.c & cpufreq_callback()
in arch/arm/kernel/smp.c (which also adjusts the jiffies). All the
loops_per_jiffy calculations will get messed up.

Scenario 2:
-----------
The governor calls __cpufreq_driver_target() to change the frequency. At the
same time, if we change scaling_{min|max}_freq from sysfs, it will end up
calling the governor's CPUFREQ_GOV_LIMITS notification, which will also call
__cpufreq_driver_target(). And hence we end up issuing concurrent calls to
->target().

Typically, platforms have the following logic in their ->target() routines:
(Eg: cpufreq-cpu0, omap, exynos, etc)

A. If new freq is more than old: Increase voltage
B. Change freq
C. If new freq is less than old: decrease voltage

Now, if the two concurrent calls to ->target() are X and Y, where X is trying to
increase the freq and Y is trying to decrease it, we get the following race
condition:

X.A: voltage gets increased for larger freq
Y.A: nothing happens
Y.B: freq gets decreased
Y.C: voltage gets decreased
X.B: freq gets increased
X.C: nothing happens

Thus we can end up setting a freq which is not supported by the voltage we have
set. That will probably make the clock to the CPU unstable and the system might
not work properly anymore.

This patch introduces a set of synchronization primitives to serialize frequency
transitions, which are to be used as shown below:

cpufreq_freq_transition_begin();

//Perform the frequency change

cpufreq_freq_transition_end();

The _begin() call sends the PRECHANGE notification whereas the _end() call sends
the POSTCHANGE notification. Also, all the necessary synchronization is handled
within these calls. In particular, even drivers which set the ASYNC_NOTIFICATION
flag can also use these APIs for performing frequency transitions (ie., you can
call _begin() from one task, and call the corresponding _end() from a different
task).

The actual synchronization underneath is not that complicated:

The key challenge is to allow drivers to begin the transition from one thread
and end it in a completely different thread (this is to enable drivers that do
asynchronous POSTCHANGE notification from bottom-halves, to also use the same
interface).

To achieve this, a 'transition_ongoing' flag, a 'transition_lock' spinlock and a
wait-queue are added per-policy. The flag and the wait-queue are used in
conjunction to create an "uninterrupted flow" from _begin() to _end(). The
spinlock is used to ensure that only one such "flow" is in flight at any given
time. Put together, this provides us all the necessary synchronization.

Signed-off-by: Srivatsa S. Bhat <srivatsa.bhat@linux.vnet.ibm.com>
Signed-off-by: Viresh Kumar <viresh.kumar@linaro.org>
Signed-off-by: Rafael J. Wysocki <rafael.j.wysocki@intel.com>