[PATCH] SELinux: reduce overhead of mls_level_isvalid()
 function call

Date	Wed, 10 Apr 2013 14:26:22 -0400

While running the high_systime workload of the AIM7 benchmark on
a 2-socket 12-core Westmere x86-64 machine running 3.8.2 kernel,
it was found that a pretty sizable amount of time was spent in the
SELinux code. Below was the perf trace of the "perf record -a -s"
of a test run at 1500 users:

  3.96%            ls  [kernel.kallsyms]     [k] ebitmap_get_bit
  1.44%            ls  [kernel.kallsyms]     [k] mls_level_isvalid
  1.33%            ls  [kernel.kallsyms]     [k] find_next_bit

The ebitmap_get_bit() was the hottest function in the perf-report
output.  Both the ebitmap_get_bit() and find_next_bit() functions
were, in fact, called by mls_level_isvalid(). As a result, the
mls_level_isvalid() call consumed 6.73% of the total CPU time of all
the 24 virtual CPUs which is quite a lot.

Looking at the mls_level_isvalid() function, it is checking to see
if all the bits set in one of the ebitmap structure are also set in
another one as well as the highest set bit is no bigger than the one
specified by the given policydb data structure. It is doing it in
a bit-by-bit manner. So if the ebitmap structure has many bits set,
the iteration loop will be done many times.

The current code can be rewritten to use a similar algorithm as the
ebitmap_contains() function with an additional check for the highest
set bit. With that change, the perf trace showed that the used CPU
time drop down to just 0.09% of the total which is about 100X less
than before.

  0.04%            ls  [kernel.kallsyms]     [k] ebitmap_get_bit
  0.04%            ls  [kernel.kallsyms]     [k] mls_level_isvalid
  0.01%            ls  [kernel.kallsyms]     [k] find_next_bit

Actually, the remaining ebitmap_get_bit() and find_next_bit() function
calls are made by other kernel routines as the new mls_level_isvalid()
function will not call them anymore.

This patch also improves the high_systime AIM7 benchmark result,
though the improvement is not as impressive as is suggested by the
reduction in CPU time. The table below shows the performance change
on the 2-socket x86-64 system mentioned above.

+--------------+---------------+----------------+-----------------+
|   Workload   | mean % change | mean % change  | mean % change   |
|              | 10-100 users  | 200-1000 users | 1100-2000 users |
+--------------+---------------+----------------+-----------------+
| high_systime |     +0.2%     |     +1.1%      |     +2.4%       |
+--------------+---------------+----------------+-----------------+
Signed-off-by: Waiman Long <Waiman.Long@hp.com>

Signed-off-by: Paul Reioux <reioux@gmail.com>