mem-ruby: HTM mem implementation
This patch augments the MESI_Three_Level Ruby protocol with hardware
transactional memory support.
The HTM implementation relies on buffering of speculative memory updates.
The core notifies the L0 cache controller that a new transaction has
started and the controller in turn places itself in transactional state
(htmTransactionalState := true).
When operating in transactional state, the usual MESI protocol changes
slightly. Lines loaded or stored are marked as part of a transaction's
read and write set respectively. If there is an invalidation request to
cache line in the read/write set, the transaction is marked as failed.
Similarly, if there is a read request by another core to a speculatively
written cache line, i.e. in the write set, the transaction is marked as
failed. If failed, all subsequent loads and stores from the core are
made benign, i.e. made into NOPS at the cache controller, and responses
are marked to indicate that the transactional state has failed. When the
core receives these marked responses, it generates a HtmFailureFault
with the reason for the transaction failure. Servicing this fault does
two things--
(a) Restores the architectural checkpoint
(b) Sends an HTM abort signal to the cache controller
The restoration includes all registers in the checkpoint as well as the
program counter of the instruction before the transaction started.
The abort signal is sent to the L0 cache controller and resets the
failed transactional state. It resets the transactional read and write
sets and invalidates any speculatively written cache lines. It also
exits the transactional state so that the MESI protocol operates as
usual.
Alternatively, if the instructions within a transaction complete without
triggering a HtmFailureFault, the transaction can be committed. The core
is responsible for notifying the cache controller that the transaction
is complete and the cache controller makes all speculative writes
visible to the rest of the system and exits the transactional state.
Notifting the cache controller is done through HtmCmd Requests which are
a subtype of Load Requests.
KUDOS:
The code is based on a previous pull request by Pradip Vallathol who
developed HTM and TSX support in Gem5 as part of his master’s thesis:
http://reviews.gem5.org/r/2308/index.html
JIRA: https://gem5.atlassian.net/browse/GEM5-587
Change-Id: Icc328df93363486e923b8bd54f4d77741d8f5650
Signed-off-by: Giacomo Travaglini <giacomo.travaglini@arm.com>
Reviewed-on: https://gem5-review.googlesource.com/c/public/gem5/+/30319
Reviewed-by: Jason Lowe-Power <power.jg@gmail.com>
Maintainer: Jason Lowe-Power <power.jg@gmail.com>
Tested-by: kokoro <noreply+kokoro@google.com>
24 files changed
