tree a5a8c61be427e3591811ff712b9ec7ef2f1a1f20
parent 2bd0cfbde2c0a74e209acbf045f1298cc2f61e01
author Mel Gorman <mel@csn.ul.ie> 1159346983 -0700
committer Linus Torvalds <torvalds@g5.osdl.org> 1159370771 -0700

[PATCH] Introduce mechanism for registering active regions of memory

At a basic level, architectures define structures to record where active
ranges of page frames are located.  Once located, the code to calculate zone
sizes and holes in each architecture is very similar.  Some of this zone and
hole sizing code is difficult to read for no good reason.  This set of patches
eliminates the similar-looking architecture-specific code.

The patches introduce a mechanism where architectures register where the
active ranges of page frames are with add_active_range().  When all areas have
been discovered, free_area_init_nodes() is called to initialise the pgdat and
zones.  The zone sizes and holes are then calculated in an architecture
independent manner.

Patch 1 introduces the mechanism for registering and initialising PFN ranges
Patch 2 changes ppc to use the mechanism - 139 arch-specific LOC removed
Patch 3 changes x86 to use the mechanism - 136 arch-specific LOC removed
Patch 4 changes x86_64 to use the mechanism - 74 arch-specific LOC removed
Patch 5 changes ia64 to use the mechanism - 52 arch-specific LOC removed
Patch 6 accounts for mem_map as a memory hole as the pages are not reclaimable.
	It adjusts the watermarks slightly

Tony Luck has successfully tested for ia64 on Itanium with tiger_defconfig,
gensparse_defconfig and defconfig.  Bob Picco has also tested and debugged on
IA64.  Jack Steiner successfully boot tested on a mammoth SGI IA64-based
machine.  These were on patches against 2.6.17-rc1 and release 3 of these
patches but there have been no ia64-changes since release 3.

There are differences in the zone sizes for x86_64 as the arch-specific code
for x86_64 accounts the kernel image and the starting mem_maps as memory holes
but the architecture-independent code accounts the memory as present.

The big benefit of this set of patches is a sizable reduction of
architecture-specific code, some of which is very hairy.  There should be a
greater reduction when other architectures use the same mechanisms for zone
and hole sizing but I lack the hardware to test on.

Additional credit;
	Dave Hansen for the initial suggestion and comments on early patches
	Andy Whitcroft for reviewing early versions and catching numerous
		errors
	Tony Luck for testing and debugging on IA64
	Bob Picco for fixing bugs related to pfn registration, reviewing a
		number of patch revisions, providing a number of suggestions
		on future direction and testing heavily
	Jack Steiner and Robin Holt for testing on IA64 and clarifying
		issues related to memory holes
	Yasunori for testing on IA64
	Andi Kleen for reviewing and feeding back about x86_64
	Christian Kujau for providing valuable information related to ACPI
		problems on x86_64 and testing potential fixes

This patch:

Define the structure to represent an active range of page frames within a node
in an architecture independent manner.  Architectures are expected to register
active ranges of PFNs using add_active_range(nid, start_pfn, end_pfn) and call
free_area_init_nodes() passing the PFNs of the end of each zone.

Signed-off-by: Mel Gorman <mel@csn.ul.ie>
Signed-off-by: Bob Picco <bob.picco@hp.com>
Cc: Dave Hansen <haveblue@us.ibm.com>
Cc: Andy Whitcroft <apw@shadowen.org>
Cc: Andi Kleen <ak@muc.de>
Cc: Benjamin Herrenschmidt <benh@kernel.crashing.org>
Cc: Paul Mackerras <paulus@samba.org>
Cc: "Keith Mannthey" <kmannth@gmail.com>
Cc: "Luck, Tony" <tony.luck@intel.com>
Cc: KAMEZAWA Hiroyuki <kamezawa.hiroyu@jp.fujitsu.com>
Cc: Yasunori Goto <y-goto@jp.fujitsu.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>