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audit: Reduce overhead using a coarse clock
Commit 2115bb25 ("audit: Use timespec64 to represent audit timestamps") noted that audit timestamps were not y2038 safe and used a 64-bit timestamp. In itself, this makes sense but the conversion was from CURRENT_TIME to ktime_get_real_ts64() which is a heavier call to record an accurate timestamp which is required in some, but not all, cases. The impact is that when auditd is running without any rules that all syscalls have higher overhead. This is visible in the sysbench-thread benchmark as a 11.5% performance hit. That benchmark is dumb as rocks but it's also visible in redis as an 8-10% hit on all operations which is of greater concern. It is somewhat stupid of audit to track syscalls without any rules related to syscalls but that is how it behaves. The overhead can be directly measured with perf comparing 4.9 with 4.12 4.9 7.76% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] __schedule 7.62% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] _raw_spin_lock 7.37% sysbench libpthread-2.22.so [.] __lll_lock_elision 7.29% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [.] syscall_return_via_sysret 6.59% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] native_sched_clock 5.21% sysbench libc-2.22.so [.] __sched_yield 4.38% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] entry_SYSCALL_64 4.28% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] do_syscall_64 3.49% sysbench libpthread-2.22.so [.] __lll_unlock_elision 3.13% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] __audit_syscall_exit 2.87% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] update_curr 2.73% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] pick_next_task_fair 2.31% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] syscall_trace_enter 2.20% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] __audit_syscall_entry ..... 0.00% swapper [kernel.vmlinux] [k] read_tsc 4.12 7.84% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] __schedule 7.05% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] _raw_spin_lock 6.57% sysbench libpthread-2.22.so [.] __lll_lock_elision 6.50% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [.] syscall_return_via_sysret 5.95% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] read_tsc 5.71% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] native_sched_clock 4.78% sysbench libc-2.22.so [.] __sched_yield 4.30% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] entry_SYSCALL_64 3.94% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] do_syscall_64 3.37% sysbench libpthread-2.22.so [.] __lll_unlock_elision 3.32% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] __audit_syscall_exit 2.91% sysbench [kernel.vmlinux] [k] __getnstimeofday64 Note the additional overhead from read_tsc which goes from 0% to 5.95%. This is on a single-socket E3-1230 but similar overheads have been measured on an older machine which the patch also eliminates. The patch in question has no explanation as to why a fully-accurate timestamp is required and is likely an oversight. Using a coarser, but monotically increasing, timestamp the overhead can be eliminated. While it can be worked around by configuring or disabling audit, it's tricky enough to detect that a kernel fix is justified. With this patch, we see the following; sysbenchthread 4.9.0 4.12.0 4.12.0 vanilla vanilla coarse-v1r1 Amean 1 1.49 ( 0.00%) 1.66 ( -11.42%) 1.51 ( -1.34%) Amean 3 1.48 ( 0.00%) 1.65 ( -11.45%) 1.50 ( -0.96%) Amean 5 1.49 ( 0.00%) 1.67 ( -12.31%) 1.51 ( -1.83%) Amean 7 1.49 ( 0.00%) 1.66 ( -11.72%) 1.50 ( -0.67%) Amean 12 1.48 ( 0.00%) 1.65 ( -11.57%) 1.52 ( -2.89%) Amean 16 1.49 ( 0.00%) 1.65 ( -11.13%) 1.51 ( -1.73%) The benchmark is reporting the time required for different thread counts to lock/unlock a private mutex which, while dense, demonstrates the syscall overhead. This is showing that 4.12 took a 11-12% hit but the overhead is almost eliminated by the patch. While the variance is not reported here, it's well within the noise with the patch applied. Signed-off-by:Mel Gorman <mgorman@techsingularity.net> Acked-by: