[Mesa-dev] [RFC] gallium/docs: add some freedreno compiler docs

Rob Clark robdclark at gmail.com
Thu Jan 29 13:11:45 PST 2015


From: Rob Clark <robclark at freedesktop.org>

Enable the 'sphinx.ext.graphviz' extension, and add in a section for
driver specific docs, with freedreno compiler docs beneath.  The
goal is for more complete compiler docs, and hopefully some docs about
other parts of the driver (such as how tiling works, etc).

Note that there is also a Distribution -> Drivers section.  Although
that appears to be simply just a list of drivers.  Not sure if that
should move under the 'Drivers' section or left alone.  I did add a
one-line section for freedreno in the existing Distribution -> Drivers
section.

Also, I'm not sure if there is a good way to link back to .rst source
files that live under the src/gallium/drivers/<foo> directory, or if
that is even desired.

At least adding this under the existing gallium docs, versus my initial
approach which setup a new sphinx build docs tree under the freedreno
driver directory, results in a much smaller patch due to not having an
extra Makefile, conf.py, etc.
---
 src/gallium/docs/source/conf.py                    |   2 +-
 src/gallium/docs/source/distro.rst                 |   5 +
 src/gallium/docs/source/drivers.rst                |   9 +
 src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno.rst      |   9 +
 .../docs/source/drivers/freedreno/ir3-notes.rst    | 386 +++++++++++++++++++++
 src/gallium/docs/source/index.rst                  |   1 +
 6 files changed, 411 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
 create mode 100644 src/gallium/docs/source/drivers.rst
 create mode 100644 src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno.rst
 create mode 100644 src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno/ir3-notes.rst

diff --git a/src/gallium/docs/source/conf.py b/src/gallium/docs/source/conf.py
index 1288666..5e8173d 100644
--- a/src/gallium/docs/source/conf.py
+++ b/src/gallium/docs/source/conf.py
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ sys.path.append(os.path.abspath('exts'))
 
 # Add any Sphinx extension module names here, as strings. They can be extensions
 # coming with Sphinx (named 'sphinx.ext.*') or your custom ones.
-extensions = ['sphinx.ext.pngmath', 'formatting']
+extensions = ['sphinx.ext.pngmath', 'sphinx.ext.graphviz', 'formatting']
 
 # Add any paths that contain templates here, relative to this directory.
 templates_path = ['_templates']
diff --git a/src/gallium/docs/source/distro.rst b/src/gallium/docs/source/distro.rst
index d69c186..a841b34 100644
--- a/src/gallium/docs/source/distro.rst
+++ b/src/gallium/docs/source/distro.rst
@@ -60,6 +60,11 @@ AMD radeonsi
 
 Driver for the AMD Southern Islands family of GPUs.
 
+freedreno
+^^^^^^^^^
+
+Driver for Qualcomm Adreno a2xx, a3xx, and a4xx series of GPUs.
+
 .. _softpipe:
 
 Softpipe
diff --git a/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers.rst b/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..469197c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+Drivers
+=======
+
+Driver specific documentation.
+
+.. toctree::
+   :glob:
+
+   drivers/*
diff --git a/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno.rst b/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..723ffdd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+Freedreno
+=========
+
+Freedreno driver specific docs.
+
+.. toctree::
+   :glob:
+
+   freedreno/*
diff --git a/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno/ir3-notes.rst b/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno/ir3-notes.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..dd28700
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/gallium/docs/source/drivers/freedreno/ir3-notes.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,386 @@
+IR3 NOTES
+=========
+
+Some notes about ir3, the compiler and machine-specific IR for the shader ISA introduced with adreno a3xx.  The same shader ISA is present, with some small differences, with adreno a4xx.
+
+Compared to the previous generation a2xx ISA (ir2), the a3xx ISA is a "simple" scalar instruction set.  However, the compiler is responsible, in most cases, to schedule the instructions.  The hardware does not try to hide the shader core pipeline stages.  For a common example, a common (cat2) ALU instruction takes four cycles, so a subsequent cat2 instruction which uses the result must have three intervening instructions (or nops).  When operating on vec4's, typically the corresponding scalar instructions for operating on the remaining three components could typically fit.  Although that results in a lot of edge cases where things fall over, like:
+
+::
+
+  ADD TEMP[0], TEMP[1], TEMP[2]
+  MUL TEMP[0], TEMP[1], TEMP[0].wzyx
+
+Here, the second instruction needs the output of the first group of scalar instructions in the wrong order, resulting in not enough instruction spots between the ``add r0.w, r1.w, r2.w`` and ``mul r0.x, r1.x, r0.w``.  Which is why the original/old compiler which merely translated nearly literally from TGSI to ir3, had a strong tendency to fall over.
+
+So the current compiler instead, in the frontend, generates a directed-acyclic-graph of instructions and basic blocks, which go through various additional passes to eventually schedule and do register assignment.
+
+For additional documentation about the hardware, see wiki: `a3xx ISA
+<https://github.com/freedreno/freedreno/wiki/A3xx-shader-instruction-set-architecture>`_.
+
+External Structure
+------------------
+
+``ir3_shader``
+    A single vertex/fragment/etc shader from gallium perspective (ie.
+    maps to a single TGSI shader), and manages a set of shader variants
+    which are generated on demand based on the shader key.
+
+``ir3_shader_key``
+    The configuration key that identifies a shader variant.  Ie. based
+    on other GL state (two-sided-color, render-to-alpha, etc) or render
+    stages (binning-pass vertex shader) different shader variants are
+    generated.
+
+``ir3_shader_variant``
+    The actual hw shader generated based on input TGSI and shader key.
+
+``ir3_compiler``
+    Compiler frontend which generates ir3 and runs the various backend
+    stages to schedule and do register assignment.
+
+The IR
+------
+
+The ir3 IR maps quite directly to the hardware, in that instruction opcodes map directly to hardware opcodes, and that dst/src register(s) map directly to the hardware dst/src register(s).  But there are a few extensions, in the form of meta_ instructions.  And additionally, for normal (non-const, etc) src registers, the ``IR3_REG_SSA`` flag is set and ``reg->instr`` points to the source instruction which produced that value.  So, for example, the following TGSI shader:
+
+::
+
+  VERT
+  DCL IN[0]
+  DCL IN[1]
+  DCL OUT[0], POSITION
+  DCL TEMP[0], LOCAL
+    1: DP3 TEMP[0].x, IN[0].xyzz, IN[1].xyzz
+    2: MOV OUT[0], TEMP[0].xxxx
+    3: END
+
+eventually generates:
+
+.. graphviz::
+
+  digraph G {
+  rankdir=RL;
+  nodesep=0.25;
+  ranksep=1.5;
+  subgraph clusterdce198 {
+  label="vert";
+  inputdce198 [shape=record,label="inputs|<in0> i0.x|<in1> i0.y|<in2> i0.z|<in4> i1.x|<in5> i1.y|<in6> i1.z"];
+  instrdcf348 [shape=record,style=filled,fillcolor=lightgrey,label="{mov.f32f32|<dst0>|<src0> }"];
+  instrdcedd0 [shape=record,style=filled,fillcolor=lightgrey,label="{mad.f32|<dst0>|<src0> |<src1> |<src2> }"];
+  inputdce198:<in2>:w -> instrdcedd0:<src0>
+  inputdce198:<in6>:w -> instrdcedd0:<src1>
+  instrdcec30 [shape=record,style=filled,fillcolor=lightgrey,label="{mad.f32|<dst0>|<src0> |<src1> |<src2> }"];
+  inputdce198:<in1>:w -> instrdcec30:<src0>
+  inputdce198:<in5>:w -> instrdcec30:<src1>
+  instrdceb60 [shape=record,style=filled,fillcolor=lightgrey,label="{mul.f|<dst0>|<src0> |<src1> }"];
+  inputdce198:<in0>:w -> instrdceb60:<src0>
+  inputdce198:<in4>:w -> instrdceb60:<src1>
+  instrdceb60:<dst0> -> instrdcec30:<src2>
+  instrdcec30:<dst0> -> instrdcedd0:<src2>
+  instrdcedd0:<dst0> -> instrdcf348:<src0>
+  instrdcf400 [shape=record,style=filled,fillcolor=lightgrey,label="{mov.f32f32|<dst0>|<src0> }"];
+  instrdcedd0:<dst0> -> instrdcf400:<src0>
+  instrdcf4b8 [shape=record,style=filled,fillcolor=lightgrey,label="{mov.f32f32|<dst0>|<src0> }"];
+  instrdcedd0:<dst0> -> instrdcf4b8:<src0>
+  outputdce198 [shape=record,label="outputs|<out0> o0.x|<out1> o0.y|<out2> o0.z|<out3> o0.w"];
+  instrdcf348:<dst0> -> outputdce198:<out0>:e
+  instrdcf400:<dst0> -> outputdce198:<out1>:e
+  instrdcf4b8:<dst0> -> outputdce198:<out2>:e
+  instrdcedd0:<dst0> -> outputdce198:<out3>:e
+  }
+  }
+
+(after scheduling, etc, but before register assignment).
+
+Internal Structure
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+``ir3_block``
+    Represents a basic block.
+
+    TODO: currently blocks are nested, but I think I need to change that
+    to a more conventional arrangement before implementing proper flow
+    control.  Currently the only flow control handles is if/else which
+    gets flattened out and results chosen with ``sel`` instructions.
+
+``ir3_instruction``
+    Represents a machine instruction or meta_ instruction.  Has pointers
+    to dst register (``regs[0]``) and src register(s) (``regs[1..n]``),
+    as needed.
+
+``ir3_register``
+    Represents a src or dst register, flags indicate const/relative/etc.
+    If ``IR3_REG_SSA`` is set on a src register, the actual register
+    number (name) has not been assigned yet, and instead the ``instr``
+    field points to src instruction.
+
+.. _meta:
+
+Meta Instructions
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+**input**
+    Used for shader inputs (registers configured in the command-stream
+    to hold particular input values, written by the shader core before
+    start of execution.  Also used for connecting up values within a
+    basic block to an output of a previous block.
+
+**output**
+    Used to hold outputs of a basic block.
+
+**flow**
+    TODO
+
+**phi**
+    TODO
+
+**fanin**
+    Groups registers which need to be assigned to consecutive scalar
+    registers, for example `sam` (texture fetch) src instructions (see
+    `register groups`_) or array element dereference
+    (see `relative addressing`_).
+
+**fanout**
+    The counterpart to **fanin**, when an instruction such as `sam`
+    writes multiple components, splits the result into individual
+    scalar components to be consumed by other instructions.
+
+**deref**
+    In the case of "array" dereference (`relative addressing`_), tracks
+    the base address value as well as the index.
+
+
+.. _`flow control`:
+
+Flow Control
+~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+TODO
+
+
+.. _`register groups`:
+
+Register Groups
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+Certain instructions, such as texture sample instructions, consume multiple consecutive scalar registers via a single src register encoded in the instruction, and/or write multiple consecutive scalar registers.  In the simplest example:
+
+::
+
+  sam (f32)(xyz)r2.x, r0.z, s#0, t#0
+
+for a 2d texture, would read ``r0.zw`` to get the coordinate, and write ``r2.xyz``.
+
+Before register assignment, to group the two components of the texture src together:
+
+.. graphviz::
+
+  digraph G {
+    { rank=same;
+      fanin;
+    };
+    { rank=same;
+      coord_x;
+      coord_y;
+    };
+    sam -> fanin [label="regs[1]"];
+    fanin -> coord_x [label="regs[1]"];
+    fanin -> coord_y [label="regs[2]"];
+    coord_x -> coord_y [label="right",style=dotted];
+    coord_y -> coord_x [label="left",style=dotted];
+    coord_x [label="coord.x"];
+    coord_y [label="coord.y"];
+  }
+
+The frontend sets up the SSA ptrs from ``sam`` source register to the ``fanin`` meta instruction, which in turn points to the instructions producing the ``coord.x`` and ``coord.y`` values.  And the grouping_ pass sets up the ``left`` and ``right`` neighbor pointers to the ``fanin``\'s sources, used later by the `register assignment`_ pass to assign blocks of scalar registers.
+
+And likewise, for the consecutive scalar registers for the destination:
+
+.. graphviz::
+
+  digraph {
+    { rank=same;
+      A;
+      B;
+      C;
+    };
+    { rank=same;
+      fanout_0;
+      fanout_1;
+      fanout_2;
+    };
+    A -> fanout_0;
+    B -> fanout_1;
+    C -> fanout_2;
+    fanout_0 [label="fanout\noff=0"];
+    fanout_0 -> sam;
+    fanout_1 [label="fanout\noff=1"];
+    fanout_1 -> sam;
+    fanout_2 [label="fanout\noff=2"];
+    fanout_2 -> sam;
+    fanout_0 -> fanout_1 [label="right",style=dotted];
+    fanout_1 -> fanout_0 [label="left",style=dotted];
+    fanout_1 -> fanout_2 [label="right",style=dotted];
+    fanout_2 -> fanout_1 [label="left",style=dotted];
+    sam;
+  }
+
+.. _`relative addressing`:
+
+Relative Addressing
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+Most instructions support a relative src flag, in which case the src value is taken from ``r<a0.x + n>`` or ``c<a0.x + n>`` (where ``n`` is encoded in the instruction.  For relative addressing of the const file (for example, a uniform array), it is relatively simple as we don't have to do register assignment of the const file.  A ``deref`` instruction points to both the address register src and encodes the constant offset.  For example:
+
+    Note that ``nop``\'s for scheduling constraints, type specifiers (ie.
+    ``add.f`` vs ``add.u``), etc, omitted for brevity in examples
+
+::
+
+  mova a0.x, hr1.y
+  add r0.x, r1.y, c<a0.x + 2>
+
+results in:
+
+.. graphviz::
+
+  digraph {
+    rankdir=LR;
+    mova;
+    deref [label="deref\noff=2"];
+    add;
+    add -> deref;
+    deref -> mova;
+  }
+
+The scheduling pass has some smarts to schedule things such that only a single ``a0.x`` value is used at any one time.
+
+To implement variable arrays, values are stored in consecutive scalar registers.  This has some overlap with `register groups`_, in that ``fanin`` and ``fanout`` are used to help group things for the `register assignment`_ pass.
+
+To use a variable array as a src register, a slight variation of what is done for const array src.  The `deref` instruction has a second src which is the `fanin` instruction that groups all the array members:
+
+::
+
+  mova a0.x, hr1.y
+  add r0.x, r1.y, r<a0.x + 2>
+
+results in:
+
+.. graphviz::
+
+  digraph {
+    mova;
+    a0 [label="a[0]"];
+    a1 [label="a[1]"];
+    a2 [label="a[2]"];
+    a3 [label="a[3]"];
+    fanin;
+    deref [label="deref\noff=?"];
+    add;
+    add -> deref;
+    deref -> mova;
+    deref -> fanin;
+    fanin -> a0;
+    fanin -> a1;
+    fanin -> a2;
+    fanin -> a3;
+  }
+
+TODO better describe how actual deref offset is derived, ie. based on array base register.
+
+To do an indirect write to a variable array, a ``fanout`` is used.  Say the array was assigned to registers ``r0.z`` through ``r1.y`` (hence the constant offset of 2):
+
+::
+
+  min r0.z, c0.x, c0.y
+  mova a0.x, hr1.y
+  add r<a0.x + 2>, r1.y, r2.x
+  mul r0.x, r0.z, c0.z
+
+
+In this case, the ``fanout`` has a second src which points back to the instruction which last wrote the array element.  In this case, the ``add`` instruction does not write all elements of the array (compared to usage of ``fanout`` for ``sam`` instructions in grouping_).  So now each array element has two potential assigners, which needs to be accounted for in scheduling_ and `register assignment`_ stages.  This is handled via that second src, and drawing ``left``/``right`` arrows between them.
+
+.. graphviz::
+
+  digraph {
+    min;
+    mova;
+    add;
+    fanout [label="fanout\noff=0"];
+    mul;
+
+    mul -> fanout;
+    fanout -> add;
+    fanout -> min;
+
+  }
+
+Note that there would in fact be ``fanin`` nodes generated for each array element (although only the reachable ones will be scheduled, etc).
+
+TODO left/right ptrs need to be set on the 2nd src's to the ``fanout``\s, but how will that work,  when the 2nd src might be the ``fanout`` from a previous indirect access???
+
+TODO scheduler probably needs to somehow enforce that the ``fanin``\s first src is scheduled before it's second src!
+
+
+Shader Passes
+-------------
+
+After the frontend has generated the use-def graph of instructions, they are run through various passes which include scheduling_ and `register assignment`_.  Because inserting ``mov`` instructions after scheduling would also require inserting additional ``nop`` instructions (since it is too late to reschedule to try and fill the bubbles), the earlier stages try to ensure that (at least given an infinite supply of registers) that `register assignment`_ after scheduling_ cannot fail.
+
+    Note that we essentially have ~256 scalar registers in the
+    architecture (although larger register usage will at some thresholds
+    limit the number of threads which can run in parallel).  And at some
+    point we will have to deal with spilling.
+
+.. _flatten:
+
+Flatten
+~~~~~~~
+
+In this stage, simple if/else blocks are flattened into a single block with ``phi`` nodes converted into ``sel`` instructions.  The a3xx ISA has very few predicated instructions, and we would prefer not to use branches for simple if/else.
+
+
+.. _`copy propagation`:
+
+Copy Propagation
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+Currently the frontend inserts ``mov``\s in various cases, because certain categories of instructions have limitations about const regs as sources.  And the CP pass simply removes all simple ``mov``\s (ie. src-type is same as dst-type, no abs/neg flags, etc).
+
+The eventual plan is to invert that, with the front-end inserting no ``mov``\s and CP legalize things.
+
+
+.. _grouping:
+
+Grouping
+~~~~~~~~
+
+In the grouping pass, instructions which need to be grouped (for ``fanin``\s, etc) have their ``left`` / ``right`` neighbor pointers setup.  In cases where there is a conflict (ie. one instruction cannot have two unique left or right neighbors), an additional ``mov`` instruction is inserted.  This ensures that there is some possible valid `register assignment`_ at the later stages.
+
+
+.. _depth:
+
+Depth
+~~~~~
+
+In the depth pass, a depth is calculated for each instruction node within it's basic block.  The depth is the sum of the required cycles (delay slots needed between two instructions plus one) of each instruction plus the max depth of any of it's source instructions.  (meta_ instructions don't add to the depth).  As an instruction's depth is calculated, it is inserted into a per block list sorted by deepest instruction.  Unreachable instructions and inputs are marked.
+
+    TODO: we should probably calculate both hard and soft depths (?) to
+    try to coax additional instructions to fit in places where we need
+    to use sync bits, such as after a texture fetch.
+
+.. _scheduling:
+
+Scheduling
+~~~~~~~~~~
+
+After the grouping_ pass, there are no more instructions to insert or remove.  Start scheduling each basic block from the deepest node in the depth sorted list created by the depth_ pass, recursively trying to schedule each instruction after it's source instructions plus delay slots.  Insert ``nop``\s as required.
+
+.. _`register assignment`:
+
+Register Assignment
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+TODO
+
+
diff --git a/src/gallium/docs/source/index.rst b/src/gallium/docs/source/index.rst
index c6cf3704..dcf8399 100644
--- a/src/gallium/docs/source/index.rst
+++ b/src/gallium/docs/source/index.rst
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ Contents:
    context
    cso
    distro
+   drivers
    glossary
 
 Indices and tables
-- 
2.1.0



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