freelist.c

Go to the documentation of this file.

/*-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 *
 * freelist.c
 *    routines for managing the buffer pool's replacement strategy.
 *
 *
 * Portions Copyright (c) 1996-2025, PostgreSQL Global Development Group
 * Portions Copyright (c) 1994, Regents of the University of California
 *
 *
 * IDENTIFICATION
 *    src/backend/storage/buffer/freelist.c
 *
 *-------------------------------------------------------------------------
 */
#include "postgres.h"
 
#include "pgstat.h"
#include "port/atomics.h"
#include "storage/buf_internals.h"
#include "storage/bufmgr.h"
#include "storage/proc.h"
 
#define INT_ACCESS_ONCE(var)    ((int)(*((volatile int *)&(var))))
 
 
/*
 * The shared freelist control information.
 */
typedef struct
{
    /* Spinlock: protects the values below */
    slock_t     buffer_strategy_lock;
 
    /*
     * clock-sweep hand: index of next buffer to consider grabbing. Note that
     * this isn't a concrete buffer - we only ever increase the value. So, to
     * get an actual buffer, it needs to be used modulo NBuffers.
     */
    pg_atomic_uint32 nextVictimBuffer;
 
    /*
     * Statistics.  These counters should be wide enough that they can't
     * overflow during a single bgwriter cycle.
     */
    uint32      completePasses; /* Complete cycles of the clock-sweep */
    pg_atomic_uint32 numBufferAllocs;   /* Buffers allocated since last reset */
 
    /*
     * Bgworker process to be notified upon activity or -1 if none. See
     * StrategyNotifyBgWriter.
     */
    int         bgwprocno;
} BufferStrategyControl;
 
/* Pointers to shared state */
static BufferStrategyControl *StrategyControl = NULL;
 
/*
 * Private (non-shared) state for managing a ring of shared buffers to re-use.
 * This is currently the only kind of BufferAccessStrategy object, but someday
 * we might have more kinds.
 */
typedef struct BufferAccessStrategyData
{
    /* Overall strategy type */
    BufferAccessStrategyType btype;
    /* Number of elements in buffers[] array */
    int         nbuffers;
 
    /*
     * Index of the "current" slot in the ring, ie, the one most recently
     * returned by GetBufferFromRing.
     */
    int         current;
 
    /*
     * Array of buffer numbers.  InvalidBuffer (that is, zero) indicates we
     * have not yet selected a buffer for this ring slot.  For allocation
     * simplicity this is palloc'd together with the fixed fields of the
     * struct.
     */
    Buffer      buffers[FLEXIBLE_ARRAY_MEMBER];
}           BufferAccessStrategyData;
 
 
/* Prototypes for internal functions */
static BufferDesc *GetBufferFromRing(BufferAccessStrategy strategy,
                                     uint32 *buf_state);
static void AddBufferToRing(BufferAccessStrategy strategy,
                            BufferDesc *buf);
 
/*
 * ClockSweepTick - Helper routine for StrategyGetBuffer()
 *
 * Move the clock hand one buffer ahead of its current position and return the
 * id of the buffer now under the hand.
 */
static inline uint32
ClockSweepTick(void)
{
    uint32      victim;
 
    /*
     * Atomically move hand ahead one buffer - if there's several processes
     * doing this, this can lead to buffers being returned slightly out of
     * apparent order.
     */
    victim =
        pg_atomic_fetch_add_u32(&StrategyControl->nextVictimBuffer, 1);
 
    if (victim >= NBuffers)
    {
        uint32      originalVictim = victim;
 
        /* always wrap what we look up in BufferDescriptors */
        victim = victim % NBuffers;
 
        /*
         * If we're the one that just caused a wraparound, force
         * completePasses to be incremented while holding the spinlock. We
         * need the spinlock so StrategySyncStart() can return a consistent
         * value consisting of nextVictimBuffer and completePasses.
         */
        if (victim == 0)
        {
            uint32      expected;
            uint32      wrapped;
            bool        success = false;
 
            expected = originalVictim + 1;
 
            while (!success)
            {
                /*
                 * Acquire the spinlock while increasing completePasses. That
                 * allows other readers to read nextVictimBuffer and
                 * completePasses in a consistent manner which is required for
                 * StrategySyncStart().  In theory delaying the increment
                 * could lead to an overflow of nextVictimBuffers, but that's
                 * highly unlikely and wouldn't be particularly harmful.
                 */
                SpinLockAcquire(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
 
                wrapped = expected % NBuffers;
 
                success = pg_atomic_compare_exchange_u32(&StrategyControl->nextVictimBuffer,
                                                         &expected, wrapped);
                if (success)
                    StrategyControl->completePasses++;
                SpinLockRelease(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
            }
        }
    }
    return victim;
}
 
/*
 * StrategyGetBuffer
 *
 *  Called by the bufmgr to get the next candidate buffer to use in
 *  BufferAlloc(). The only hard requirement BufferAlloc() has is that
 *  the selected buffer must not currently be pinned by anyone.
 *
 *  strategy is a BufferAccessStrategy object, or NULL for default strategy.
 *
 *  To ensure that no one else can pin the buffer before we do, we must
 *  return the buffer with the buffer header spinlock still held.
 */
BufferDesc *
StrategyGetBuffer(BufferAccessStrategy strategy, uint32 *buf_state, bool *from_ring)
{
    BufferDesc *buf;
    int         bgwprocno;
    int         trycounter;
    uint32      local_buf_state;    /* to avoid repeated (de-)referencing */
 
    *from_ring = false;
 
    /*
     * If given a strategy object, see whether it can select a buffer. We
     * assume strategy objects don't need buffer_strategy_lock.
     */
    if (strategy != NULL)
    {
        buf = GetBufferFromRing(strategy, buf_state);
        if (buf != NULL)
        {
            *from_ring = true;
            return buf;
        }
    }
 
    /*
     * If asked, we need to waken the bgwriter. Since we don't want to rely on
     * a spinlock for this we force a read from shared memory once, and then
     * set the latch based on that value. We need to go through that length
     * because otherwise bgwprocno might be reset while/after we check because
     * the compiler might just reread from memory.
     *
     * This can possibly set the latch of the wrong process if the bgwriter
     * dies in the wrong moment. But since PGPROC->procLatch is never
     * deallocated the worst consequence of that is that we set the latch of
     * some arbitrary process.
     */
    bgwprocno = INT_ACCESS_ONCE(StrategyControl->bgwprocno);
    if (bgwprocno != -1)
    {
        /* reset bgwprocno first, before setting the latch */
        StrategyControl->bgwprocno = -1;
 
        /*
         * Not acquiring ProcArrayLock here which is slightly icky. It's
         * actually fine because procLatch isn't ever freed, so we just can
         * potentially set the wrong process' (or no process') latch.
         */
        SetLatch(&ProcGlobal->allProcs[bgwprocno].procLatch);
    }
 
    /*
     * We count buffer allocation requests so that the bgwriter can estimate
     * the rate of buffer consumption.  Note that buffers recycled by a
     * strategy object are intentionally not counted here.
     */
    pg_atomic_fetch_add_u32(&StrategyControl->numBufferAllocs, 1);
 
    /* Use the "clock sweep" algorithm to find a free buffer */
    trycounter = NBuffers;
    for (;;)
    {
        buf = GetBufferDescriptor(ClockSweepTick());
 
        /*
         * If the buffer is pinned or has a nonzero usage_count, we cannot use
         * it; decrement the usage_count (unless pinned) and keep scanning.
         */
        local_buf_state = LockBufHdr(buf);
 
        if (BUF_STATE_GET_REFCOUNT(local_buf_state) == 0)
        {
            if (BUF_STATE_GET_USAGECOUNT(local_buf_state) != 0)
            {
                local_buf_state -= BUF_USAGECOUNT_ONE;
 
                trycounter = NBuffers;
            }
            else
            {
                /* Found a usable buffer */
                if (strategy != NULL)
                    AddBufferToRing(strategy, buf);
                *buf_state = local_buf_state;
                return buf;
            }
        }
        else if (--trycounter == 0)
        {
            /*
             * We've scanned all the buffers without making any state changes,
             * so all the buffers are pinned (or were when we looked at them).
             * We could hope that someone will free one eventually, but it's
             * probably better to fail than to risk getting stuck in an
             * infinite loop.
             */
            UnlockBufHdr(buf, local_buf_state);
            elog(ERROR, "no unpinned buffers available");
        }
        UnlockBufHdr(buf, local_buf_state);
    }
}
 
/*
 * StrategySyncStart -- tell BgBufferSync where to start syncing
 *
 * The result is the buffer index of the best buffer to sync first.
 * BgBufferSync() will proceed circularly around the buffer array from there.
 *
 * In addition, we return the completed-pass count (which is effectively
 * the higher-order bits of nextVictimBuffer) and the count of recent buffer
 * allocs if non-NULL pointers are passed.  The alloc count is reset after
 * being read.
 */
int
StrategySyncStart(uint32 *complete_passes, uint32 *num_buf_alloc)
{
    uint32      nextVictimBuffer;
    int         result;
 
    SpinLockAcquire(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
    nextVictimBuffer = pg_atomic_read_u32(&StrategyControl->nextVictimBuffer);
    result = nextVictimBuffer % NBuffers;
 
    if (complete_passes)
    {
        *complete_passes = StrategyControl->completePasses;
 
        /*
         * Additionally add the number of wraparounds that happened before
         * completePasses could be incremented. C.f. ClockSweepTick().
         */
        *complete_passes += nextVictimBuffer / NBuffers;
    }
 
    if (num_buf_alloc)
    {
        *num_buf_alloc = pg_atomic_exchange_u32(&StrategyControl->numBufferAllocs, 0);
    }
    SpinLockRelease(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
    return result;
}
 
/*
 * StrategyNotifyBgWriter -- set or clear allocation notification latch
 *
 * If bgwprocno isn't -1, the next invocation of StrategyGetBuffer will
 * set that latch.  Pass -1 to clear the pending notification before it
 * happens.  This feature is used by the bgwriter process to wake itself up
 * from hibernation, and is not meant for anybody else to use.
 */
void
StrategyNotifyBgWriter(int bgwprocno)
{
    /*
     * We acquire buffer_strategy_lock just to ensure that the store appears
     * atomic to StrategyGetBuffer.  The bgwriter should call this rather
     * infrequently, so there's no performance penalty from being safe.
     */
    SpinLockAcquire(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
    StrategyControl->bgwprocno = bgwprocno;
    SpinLockRelease(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
}
 
 
/*
 * StrategyShmemSize
 *
 * estimate the size of shared memory used by the freelist-related structures.
 *
 * Note: for somewhat historical reasons, the buffer lookup hashtable size
 * is also determined here.
 */
Size
StrategyShmemSize(void)
{
    Size        size = 0;
 
    /* size of lookup hash table ... see comment in StrategyInitialize */
    size = add_size(size, BufTableShmemSize(NBuffers + NUM_BUFFER_PARTITIONS));
 
    /* size of the shared replacement strategy control block */
    size = add_size(size, MAXALIGN(sizeof(BufferStrategyControl)));
 
    return size;
}
 
/*
 * StrategyInitialize -- initialize the buffer cache replacement
 *      strategy.
 *
 * Assumes: All of the buffers are already built into a linked list.
 *      Only called by postmaster and only during initialization.
 */
void
StrategyInitialize(bool init)
{
    bool        found;
 
    /*
     * Initialize the shared buffer lookup hashtable.
     *
     * Since we can't tolerate running out of lookup table entries, we must be
     * sure to specify an adequate table size here.  The maximum steady-state
     * usage is of course NBuffers entries, but BufferAlloc() tries to insert
     * a new entry before deleting the old.  In principle this could be
     * happening in each partition concurrently, so we could need as many as
     * NBuffers + NUM_BUFFER_PARTITIONS entries.
     */
    InitBufTable(NBuffers + NUM_BUFFER_PARTITIONS);
 
    /*
     * Get or create the shared strategy control block
     */
    StrategyControl = (BufferStrategyControl *)
        ShmemInitStruct("Buffer Strategy Status",
                        sizeof(BufferStrategyControl),
                        &found);
 
    if (!found)
    {
        /*
         * Only done once, usually in postmaster
         */
        Assert(init);
 
        SpinLockInit(&StrategyControl->buffer_strategy_lock);
 
        /* Initialize the clock-sweep pointer */
        pg_atomic_init_u32(&StrategyControl->nextVictimBuffer, 0);
 
        /* Clear statistics */
        StrategyControl->completePasses = 0;
        pg_atomic_init_u32(&StrategyControl->numBufferAllocs, 0);
 
        /* No pending notification */
        StrategyControl->bgwprocno = -1;
    }
    else
        Assert(!init);
}
 
 
/* ----------------------------------------------------------------
 *              Backend-private buffer ring management
 * ----------------------------------------------------------------
 */
 
 
/*
 * GetAccessStrategy -- create a BufferAccessStrategy object
 *
 * The object is allocated in the current memory context.
 */
BufferAccessStrategy
GetAccessStrategy(BufferAccessStrategyType btype)
{
    int         ring_size_kb;
 
    /*
     * Select ring size to use.  See buffer/README for rationales.
     *
     * Note: if you change the ring size for BAS_BULKREAD, see also
     * SYNC_SCAN_REPORT_INTERVAL in access/heap/syncscan.c.
     */
    switch (btype)
    {
        case BAS_NORMAL:
            /* if someone asks for NORMAL, just give 'em a "default" object */
            return NULL;
 
        case BAS_BULKREAD:
            {
                int         ring_max_kb;
 
                /*
                 * The ring always needs to be large enough to allow some
                 * separation in time between providing a buffer to the user
                 * of the strategy and that buffer being reused. Otherwise the
                 * user's pin will prevent reuse of the buffer, even without
                 * concurrent activity.
                 *
                 * We also need to ensure the ring always is large enough for
                 * SYNC_SCAN_REPORT_INTERVAL, as noted above.
                 *
                 * Thus we start out a minimal size and increase the size
                 * further if appropriate.
                 */
                ring_size_kb = 256;
 
                /*
                 * There's no point in a larger ring if we won't be allowed to
                 * pin sufficiently many buffers.  But we never limit to less
                 * than the minimal size above.
                 */
                ring_max_kb = GetPinLimit() * (BLCKSZ / 1024);
                ring_max_kb = Max(ring_size_kb, ring_max_kb);
 
                /*
                 * We would like the ring to additionally have space for the
                 * configured degree of IO concurrency. While being read in,
                 * buffers can obviously not yet be reused.
                 *
                 * Each IO can be up to io_combine_limit blocks large, and we
                 * want to start up to effective_io_concurrency IOs.
                 *
                 * Note that effective_io_concurrency may be 0, which disables
                 * AIO.
                 */
                ring_size_kb += (BLCKSZ / 1024) *
                    io_combine_limit * effective_io_concurrency;
 
                if (ring_size_kb > ring_max_kb)
                    ring_size_kb = ring_max_kb;
                break;
            }
        case BAS_BULKWRITE:
            ring_size_kb = 16 * 1024;
            break;
        case BAS_VACUUM:
            ring_size_kb = 2048;
            break;
 
        default:
            elog(ERROR, "unrecognized buffer access strategy: %d",
                 (int) btype);
            return NULL;        /* keep compiler quiet */
    }
 
    return GetAccessStrategyWithSize(btype, ring_size_kb);
}
 
/*
 * GetAccessStrategyWithSize -- create a BufferAccessStrategy object with a
 *      number of buffers equivalent to the passed in size.
 *
 * If the given ring size is 0, no BufferAccessStrategy will be created and
 * the function will return NULL.  ring_size_kb must not be negative.
 */
BufferAccessStrategy
GetAccessStrategyWithSize(BufferAccessStrategyType btype, int ring_size_kb)
{
    int         ring_buffers;
    BufferAccessStrategy strategy;
 
    Assert(ring_size_kb >= 0);
 
    /* Figure out how many buffers ring_size_kb is */
    ring_buffers = ring_size_kb / (BLCKSZ / 1024);
 
    /* 0 means unlimited, so no BufferAccessStrategy required */
    if (ring_buffers == 0)
        return NULL;
 
    /* Cap to 1/8th of shared_buffers */
    ring_buffers = Min(NBuffers / 8, ring_buffers);
 
    /* NBuffers should never be less than 16, so this shouldn't happen */
    Assert(ring_buffers > 0);
 
    /* Allocate the object and initialize all elements to zeroes */
    strategy = (BufferAccessStrategy)
        palloc0(offsetof(BufferAccessStrategyData, buffers) +
                ring_buffers * sizeof(Buffer));
 
    /* Set fields that don't start out zero */
    strategy->btype = btype;
    strategy->nbuffers = ring_buffers;
 
    return strategy;
}
 
/*
 * GetAccessStrategyBufferCount -- an accessor for the number of buffers in
 *      the ring
 *
 * Returns 0 on NULL input to match behavior of GetAccessStrategyWithSize()
 * returning NULL with 0 size.
 */
int
GetAccessStrategyBufferCount(BufferAccessStrategy strategy)
{
    if (strategy == NULL)
        return 0;
 
    return strategy->nbuffers;
}
 
/*
 * GetAccessStrategyPinLimit -- get cap of number of buffers that should be pinned
 *
 * When pinning extra buffers to look ahead, users of a ring-based strategy are
 * in danger of pinning too much of the ring at once while performing look-ahead.
 * For some strategies, that means "escaping" from the ring, and in others it
 * means forcing dirty data to disk very frequently with associated WAL
 * flushing.  Since external code has no insight into any of that, allow
 * individual strategy types to expose a clamp that should be applied when
 * deciding on a maximum number of buffers to pin at once.
 *
 * Callers should combine this number with other relevant limits and take the
 * minimum.
 */
int
GetAccessStrategyPinLimit(BufferAccessStrategy strategy)
{
    if (strategy == NULL)
        return NBuffers;
 
    switch (strategy->btype)
    {
        case BAS_BULKREAD:
 
            /*
             * Since BAS_BULKREAD uses StrategyRejectBuffer(), dirty buffers
             * shouldn't be a problem and the caller is free to pin up to the
             * entire ring at once.
             */
            return strategy->nbuffers;
 
        default:
 
            /*
             * Tell caller not to pin more than half the buffers in the ring.
             * This is a trade-off between look ahead distance and deferring
             * writeback and associated WAL traffic.
             */
            return strategy->nbuffers / 2;
    }
}
 
/*
 * FreeAccessStrategy -- release a BufferAccessStrategy object
 *
 * A simple pfree would do at the moment, but we would prefer that callers
 * don't assume that much about the representation of BufferAccessStrategy.
 */
void
FreeAccessStrategy(BufferAccessStrategy strategy)
{
    /* don't crash if called on a "default" strategy */
    if (strategy != NULL)
        pfree(strategy);
}
 
/*
 * GetBufferFromRing -- returns a buffer from the ring, or NULL if the
 *      ring is empty / not usable.
 *
 * The bufhdr spin lock is held on the returned buffer.
 */
static BufferDesc *
GetBufferFromRing(BufferAccessStrategy strategy, uint32 *buf_state)
{
    BufferDesc *buf;
    Buffer      bufnum;
    uint32      local_buf_state;    /* to avoid repeated (de-)referencing */
 
 
    /* Advance to next ring slot */
    if (++strategy->current >= strategy->nbuffers)
        strategy->current = 0;
 
    /*
     * If the slot hasn't been filled yet, tell the caller to allocate a new
     * buffer with the normal allocation strategy.  He will then fill this
     * slot by calling AddBufferToRing with the new buffer.
     */
    bufnum = strategy->buffers[strategy->current];
    if (bufnum == InvalidBuffer)
        return NULL;
 
    /*
     * If the buffer is pinned we cannot use it under any circumstances.
     *
     * If usage_count is 0 or 1 then the buffer is fair game (we expect 1,
     * since our own previous usage of the ring element would have left it
     * there, but it might've been decremented by clock-sweep since then). A
     * higher usage_count indicates someone else has touched the buffer, so we
     * shouldn't re-use it.
     */
    buf = GetBufferDescriptor(bufnum - 1);
    local_buf_state = LockBufHdr(buf);
    if (BUF_STATE_GET_REFCOUNT(local_buf_state) == 0
        && BUF_STATE_GET_USAGECOUNT(local_buf_state) <= 1)
    {
        *buf_state = local_buf_state;
        return buf;
    }
    UnlockBufHdr(buf, local_buf_state);
 
    /*
     * Tell caller to allocate a new buffer with the normal allocation
     * strategy.  He'll then replace this ring element via AddBufferToRing.
     */
    return NULL;
}
 
/*
 * AddBufferToRing -- add a buffer to the buffer ring
 *
 * Caller must hold the buffer header spinlock on the buffer.  Since this
 * is called with the spinlock held, it had better be quite cheap.
 */
static void
AddBufferToRing(BufferAccessStrategy strategy, BufferDesc *buf)
{
    strategy->buffers[strategy->current] = BufferDescriptorGetBuffer(buf);
}
 
/*
 * Utility function returning the IOContext of a given BufferAccessStrategy's
 * strategy ring.
 */
IOContext
IOContextForStrategy(BufferAccessStrategy strategy)
{
    if (!strategy)
        return IOCONTEXT_NORMAL;
 
    switch (strategy->btype)
    {
        case BAS_NORMAL:
 
            /*
             * Currently, GetAccessStrategy() returns NULL for
             * BufferAccessStrategyType BAS_NORMAL, so this case is
             * unreachable.
             */
            pg_unreachable();
            return IOCONTEXT_NORMAL;
        case BAS_BULKREAD:
            return IOCONTEXT_BULKREAD;
        case BAS_BULKWRITE:
            return IOCONTEXT_BULKWRITE;
        case BAS_VACUUM:
            return IOCONTEXT_VACUUM;
    }
 
    elog(ERROR, "unrecognized BufferAccessStrategyType: %d", strategy->btype);
    pg_unreachable();
}
 
/*
 * StrategyRejectBuffer -- consider rejecting a dirty buffer
 *
 * When a nondefault strategy is used, the buffer manager calls this function
 * when it turns out that the buffer selected by StrategyGetBuffer needs to
 * be written out and doing so would require flushing WAL too.  This gives us
 * a chance to choose a different victim.
 *
 * Returns true if buffer manager should ask for a new victim, and false
 * if this buffer should be written and re-used.
 */
bool
StrategyRejectBuffer(BufferAccessStrategy strategy, BufferDesc *buf, bool from_ring)
{
    /* We only do this in bulkread mode */
    if (strategy->btype != BAS_BULKREAD)
        return false;
 
    /* Don't muck with behavior of normal buffer-replacement strategy */
    if (!from_ring ||
        strategy->buffers[strategy->current] != BufferDescriptorGetBuffer(buf))
        return false;
 
    /*
     * Remove the dirty buffer from the ring; necessary to prevent infinite
     * loop if all ring members are dirty.
     */
    strategy->buffers[strategy->current] = InvalidBuffer;
 
    return true;
}