From nobody Wed Jun 24 00:31:43 2026 Return-Path: X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.0 (2014-02-07) on aws-us-west-2-korg-lkml-1.web.codeaurora.org Received: from vger.kernel.org (vger.kernel.org [23.128.96.18]) by smtp.lore.kernel.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D3EB6C433F5 for ; Tue, 15 Mar 2022 14:12:36 +0000 (UTC) Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1349043AbiCOONr (ORCPT ); Tue, 15 Mar 2022 10:13:47 -0400 Received: from lindbergh.monkeyblade.net ([23.128.96.19]:57092 "EHLO lindbergh.monkeyblade.net" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1344743AbiCOONm (ORCPT ); Tue, 15 Mar 2022 10:13:42 -0400 Received: from mail-pl1-x62f.google.com (mail-pl1-x62f.google.com [IPv6:2607:f8b0:4864:20::62f]) by lindbergh.monkeyblade.net (Postfix) with ESMTPS id 7858F546AA; Tue, 15 Mar 2022 07:12:30 -0700 (PDT) Received: by mail-pl1-x62f.google.com with SMTP id t22so5096784plo.0; Tue, 15 Mar 2022 07:12:30 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=20210112; h=from:to:cc:subject:date:message-id:mime-version :content-transfer-encoding; bh=oBjCmranFtHv1vltq1QMGyO83TXiM11V7MrR46Em3wg=; b=flgislALV+7xmb46BtergdR0pysltSIUFlYlXfHfsQ8uuQZPV3r2jE6Aqk7Zk6dTfG tNpHH5+cqF4RYzJYM6XVgc6T6utSbHG3vyBOO2sg0Dd4X1mO/BEj0vwYd8WUA/HsN7K1 izZxh0pArEDoqTxYpoXKdmfZxIw1B+WUdYJxxZ2XvqHm5PDW4x0FDsjR13XuFpwWfwl/ D0cdQYuAt0gE/oaOp7mOVow+HfkptY4r0SZ9CM34QzE0GpZvwqkkthk7XR9BLJVal0KT x5jdq8Ea3uL5Zx0Gmoy7397guqa4ZMZg0wOQ16gyUMztFYDNbdjfUajEb+sM8EaJ6QfT 22JA== X-Google-DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=1e100.net; s=20210112; h=x-gm-message-state:from:to:cc:subject:date:message-id:mime-version :content-transfer-encoding; bh=oBjCmranFtHv1vltq1QMGyO83TXiM11V7MrR46Em3wg=; b=eoaMFiGavupTUf/3QBzNJ06hYkdEG9Ko7jZOUbwtPxfnGRq1ZGARo1x4eoBKAjBahy Hr0XZHiwgYFKPl8zmp8hMyhdoEIAUOCfCwWuRYGJAkD8RLRnsk0ZIJPysUjYT0WHCuOm QEDlHizap4izwR6TLzEwcwsdLdmTUtdmmg/BoPB83bihYvHyJghexDZ1vj1UnHYhEYj6 JJJxUTIwhjZy632UoetWyj00rTNMKWUcaTVeXBtqWhEec1N/Z3dKj6WZwz00HEkAbQ39 kckMKFCL7L+gURIsijNiMB+ChjPR1I/6FQwYTTOc80qPtGGvLPXT9dVoeiJzeOVUEs96 c7+Q== X-Gm-Message-State: AOAM532Q3SvII62qOM2oSq5cRWvJMi4/wFGiuxUDmCPSNf8Iffe1JTMI ilgpdIzda6ziGwbTOumxe5E= X-Google-Smtp-Source: ABdhPJz+bw0vZYPd6K41rTu627G1+NBT2paw4d81Ygh+VlOZIvUqJwJj0ZxHPLteYixdQSJavNgtkw== X-Received: by 2002:a17:90b:3b8c:b0:1c5:ce7c:51de with SMTP id pc12-20020a17090b3b8c00b001c5ce7c51demr4854334pjb.182.1647353549828; Tue, 15 Mar 2022 07:12:29 -0700 (PDT) Received: from localhost.localdomain ([2001:288:7001:2708:9207:10e8:3cd5:9c86]) by smtp.gmail.com with ESMTPSA id t9-20020a655549000000b0036570f81245sm20167129pgr.84.2022.03.15.07.12.24 (version=TLS1_3 cipher=TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384 bits=256/256); Tue, 15 Mar 2022 07:12:28 -0700 (PDT) From: Jui-Tse Huang To: Jonathan Corbet , Peter Zijlstra , Valentin Schneider , Mauro Carvalho Chehab , Huaixin Chang , Beata Michalska , Chun-Hung Tseng , linux-doc@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Cc: Jui-Tse Huang , Ching-Chun Huang , Randy Dunlap , Brendan Gregg , Yiwei Lin Subject: [PATCH v3] docs/scheduler: Introduce the doc of load average Date: Tue, 15 Mar 2022 22:08:57 +0800 Message-Id: <20220315140857.41697-1-juitse.huang@gmail.com> X-Mailer: git-send-email 2.25.1 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Precedence: bulk List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" The load average is one of a common as well as easy observed statistic provied by Linux, but still not well documented, which makes the numbers that users observes from the output of top, htop or other system monitoring application are only numbers. This patch gives a discussion on how Linux calculates the load average as well as what metrics are concerned while calculating the load average. The discussion flow is divided into several parts: 1. The expression used to get the load average. 2. Why Linux choose such average method from the other. 2. The meaning of each term in the expression. 3. The metrics, that is, the type of tasks that will be covered in the calculation. 4. A brief explanation over the fixed-point nubmer since the weights defined in the Linux kernel are based on it. Signed-off-by: Jui-Tse Huang Signed-off-by: Yiwei Lin Signed-off-by: Ching-Chun (Jim) Huang Co-Developed-by: Yiwei Lin Reviewed-by: Randy Dunlap --- v3: - Fix typo (Randy Dunlap) - Add further reading that links to Brendan Gregg's blog v2: - Fix typo (Chun-Hung Tseng)=20 Documentation/scheduler/index.rst | 1 + Documentation/scheduler/load-average.rst | 82 ++++++++++++++++++++++++ 2 files changed, 83 insertions(+) create mode 100644 Documentation/scheduler/load-average.rst diff --git a/Documentation/scheduler/index.rst b/Documentation/scheduler/in= dex.rst index 88900aabdbf7..bdc779b4190f 100644 --- a/Documentation/scheduler/index.rst +++ b/Documentation/scheduler/index.rst @@ -17,6 +17,7 @@ Linux Scheduler sched-nice-design sched-rt-group sched-stats + load-average =20 text_files =20 diff --git a/Documentation/scheduler/load-average.rst b/Documentation/sched= uler/load-average.rst new file mode 100644 index 000000000000..27ce6cbae5f4 --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/scheduler/load-average.rst @@ -0,0 +1,82 @@ +=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D +Load Average +=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D + +The load average, provided by common operating systems, indicates the aver= age +number of system load over a period of time. In Linux, it shows the avera= ge +number of tasks running and waiting for CPU time. The following expression= is +used in Linux to update the load average:: + + / 0 , if t =3D 0 + load_{t} =3D | + \ load_{t - 1} * exp + active * (1 - exp), otherwise + +The expression represents the exponential moving average of the historical +loading of the system. There are several reasons that Linux kernel chooses +exponential moving average from other similar average equations such as si= mple +moving average or cumulative moving average: + +#. The exponential moving average consumes fixed memory space, while the s= imple + moving average has O(n) space complexity where n is the number of times= lices + within a given interval. +#. The exponential moving average not only applies a higher weight to the = most + recent record but also declines the weight exponentially, which makes t= he + resulting load average reflect the situation of the current system. Nei= ther + the simple moving average nor cumulative moving average has this featur= e. + +In the expression, the load_{t} indicates the calculated load average at t= he +given time t. +The active is the most recent recorded system load. In Linux, the system l= oad +means the number of tasks in the state of TASK_RUNNING or TASK_UNINTERRUPT= IBLE +of the entire system. Tasks with TASK_UNINTERRUPTIBLE state are usually wa= iting +for disk I/O or holding an uninterruptible lock, which is considered as a = part +of system resource, thus, Linux kernel covers them while calculating the l= oad +average. +The exp means the weight applied to the previous report of load average, w= hile +(1 - exp) is the weight applied to the most recently recorded system load. +There are three different weights defined in the Linux kernel, in +include/linux/sched/loadavg.h, to perform statistics in various timescales= :: + + // include/linux/sched/loadavg.h + ... + #define EXP_1 1884 /* 1/exp(5sec/1min) as fixed-point */ + #define EXP_5 2014 /* 1/exp(5sec/5min) */ + #define EXP_15 2037 /* 1/exp(5sec/15min) */ + ... + +According to the expression shown on the top of this page, the weight (exp) +controls how much of the last load load_{t - 1} will take place in the +calculation of current load, while (1 - exp) is the weight applied to the = most +recent record of system load active. + +Due to the security issue, the weights are defined as fixed-point numbers = based +on the unsigned integer rather than floating-pointing numbers. The introdu= ction +of the fixed-point number keeps the FPU away from the calculation process.= Since +the precision of the fixed-point used in the Linux kernel is 11 bits, a +fixed-point can be converted to a floating-point by dividing it by 2048, a= s in +the expressions shown bellow:: + + EXP_1 =3D 1884 / 2048 =3D 0.919922 + EXP_5 =3D 2014 / 2048 =3D 0.983398 + EXP_15 =3D 2037 / 2048 =3D 0.994629 + +Which indicates the weights applied to active are:: + + (1 - EXP_1) =3D (1 - 0.919922) =3D 0.080078 + (1 - EXP_5) =3D (1 - 0.983398) =3D 0.016602 + (1 - EXP_15) =3D (1 - 0.994629) =3D 0.005371 + +The load average will be updated every 5 seconds. Each time the scheduler_= tick() +be called, the function calc_global_load_tick() will also be invoked, which +makes the active of each CPU core be calculated and be merged globally. Fi= nally, +the load average will be updated with that global active. + +As a user, the load average can be observed via top, htop, or other system +monitor application, or more directly, by the following command:: + + $ cat /proc/loadavg + +Further Reading +--------------- +The explanation and analysis done by Brendan Gregg on `his blog +`_. --=20 2.25.1