[AArch64] Expand bcmp() for small comparisons

[evandro]

Summary

Patch D56593 by @courbet causes bcmp() to be emitted in some cases. Unfortunately, TTI::MemCmpExpansionOptions() is not overridden by AArch64, which results in calls to bcmp() even for small constant values. In a proprietary benchmark we see a performance drop of about 12% on PNG compression before this patch, though it passes all tests.

This patch mirrors how X86 initializes TTI::MemCmpExpansionOptions() to then expand calls to bcmp() when appropriate. No tuning of the parameters was performed, but, at this point, it's enough to recover the performance drop above.

This problem also exists on ARM. Once a consensus is reached for AArch64, we can work to fix ARM as well.

Authors: Evandro Menezes (@evandro) <[e-mail]>, Brian Rzycki (@brzycki) <[e-mail]>

[SjoerdMeijer]

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

625

why 2?

626

How about vector loads and alignment? Can we generate them for this, and do we then also need 16 byte loads to loadsizes?

llvm/test/CodeGen/AArch64/bcmp-inline-small.ll

3

I think tests are missing for:

• code-size
• edge cases for NumLoadsPerBlock and MaxNumLoads

[brzycki]

Hello @SjoerdMeijer , thank you for the review.

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

625

@evandro selected these based on the x8_64 values set in llvm/lib/Target/X86/X86TargetTransformInfo.cpp:

Options.MaxNumLoads = TLI->getMaxExpandSizeMemcmp(OptSize);
Options.NumLoadsPerBlock = 2;
// ...
if (ST->is64Bit()) {
  Options.LoadSizes.push_back(8);
}
Options.LoadSizes.push_back(4);
Options.LoadSizes.push_back(2);
Options.LoadSizes.push_back(1);

I do not know why x86_64 selected these values.

626

Interesting question, I'll defer to @evandro when he can comment on the ticket. There is a bit more logic in x86_64 he stripped out when building this patch:

if (IsZeroCmp) {
  // Only enable vector loads for equality comparison. Right now the vector
  // version is not as fast for three way compare (see #33329).
  // TODO: enable AVX512 when the DAG is ready.
  // if (ST->hasAVX512()) Options.LoadSizes.push_back(64);
  const unsigned PreferredWidth = ST->getPreferVectorWidth();
  if (PreferredWidth >= 256 && ST->hasAVX2()) Options.LoadSizes.push_back(32);
  if (PreferredWidth >= 128 && ST->hasSSE2()) Options.LoadSizes.push_back(16);
  // All GPR and vector loads can be unaligned. SIMD compare requires integer
  // vectors (SSE2/AVX2).
  Options.AllowOverlappingLoads = true;
}

llvm/test/CodeGen/AArch64/bcmp-inline-small.ll

3

Understood. I'll try to build cases to accommodate these checks.

[courbet]

FYI there are some benchmarks in https://reviews.llvm.org/D64082 that are not submitted but could be used as basis for making decisions for this patch.

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

625

This does trades loads for jumps: with this setting, each block will be twice as big (more work per block) but there will be half as many blocks.

This was found to be more efficient in general on x86, and might not be true for arm. This will have to be benchmarked.

626

For x86, vector loads are enabled only for equality comparison because there is no efficient vector-sized bswap.

I don't know much about arm, but:

• if vector loads and equality comparisons are efficient there is no reason not to use them if IsZeroCmp
• if there is an efficient vector-sized bswap vector sizes can be used in both cases

[evandro]

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

625

As @courbet said, the best figure may be different, but this seemed like a sensible starting point. Since A64 has more registers, methinks that a higher value might be beneficial, but it depends on how many live registers there are.

626

Vector loads are efficient, performance wise, on A64, but typically not so much power wise. That's why I'm not adding them just yet. If so, then vector byte swaps may be used.

[evandro]

Ping! 🔔

[SjoerdMeijer]

Still think regressions tests are missing, e.g. for code-size (see a previous comments).

[SjoerdMeijer]

llvm/test/CodeGen/AArch64/bcmp-inline-small.ll

30

ah, sorry, that test case is here

[SjoerdMeijer]

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

625

These options look a lot more sensible now as TLI is used, but has this actually been benchmarked?

626

Adding this comment as a // FIXME or // TODO would be good I guess.

[evandro]

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

625

As I said above, not extensively. But enough to close the gap that motivated this patch. As it stands, even without carefully mined values, at least the egregious regression from not inlining bcmp() is addressed.

[SjoerdMeijer]

Okay, cheers, looks reasonable to me.

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64ISelLowering.cpp

AArch64TargetLowering::AArch64TargetLowering(const TargetMachine &TM,
 
   MaxGluedStoresPerMemcpy = 4;
   MaxStoresPerMemcpyOptSize = 4;
   MaxStoresPerMemcpy = Subtarget->requiresStrictAlign()
                        ? MaxStoresPerMemcpyOptSize : 16;
 
   MaxStoresPerMemmoveOptSize = MaxStoresPerMemmove = 4;
 
+  MaxLoadsPerMemcmpOptSize = 4;
+  MaxLoadsPerMemcmp = Subtarget->requiresStrictAlign()
+                      ? MaxLoadsPerMemcmpOptSize : 8;
+
   setStackPointerRegisterToSaveRestore(AArch64::SP);
 
   setSchedulingPreference(Sched::Hybrid);
 
   EnableExtLdPromotion = true;
 
   // Set required alignment.
   setMinFunctionAlignment(2);

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.h

int getArithmeticInstrCost(
       TTI::OperandValueProperties Opd2PropInfo = TTI::OP_None,
       ArrayRef<const Value *> Args = ArrayRef<const Value *>());
 
   int getAddressComputationCost(Type *Ty, ScalarEvolution *SE, const SCEV *Ptr);
 
   int getCmpSelInstrCost(unsigned Opcode, Type *ValTy, Type *CondTy,
                          const Instruction *I = nullptr);
 
+  TTI::MemCmpExpansionOptions enableMemCmpExpansion(bool OptSize,
+                                                    bool IsZeroCmp) const;
+
   int getMemoryOpCost(unsigned Opcode, Type *Src, unsigned Alignment,
                       unsigned AddressSpace, const Instruction *I = nullptr);
 
   int getCostOfKeepingLiveOverCall(ArrayRef<Type *> Tys);
 
   void getUnrollingPreferences(Loop *L, ScalarEvolution &SE,
                                TTI::UnrollingPreferences &UP);
 

llvm/lib/Target/AArch64/AArch64TargetTransformInfo.cpp

if (SelCondTy.isSimple() && SelValTy.isSimple()) {
                                                      SelCondTy.getSimpleVT(),
                                                      SelValTy.getSimpleVT()))
         return Entry->Cost;
     }
   }
   return BaseT::getCmpSelInstrCost(Opcode, ValTy, CondTy, I);
 }
 
+AArch64TTIImpl::TTI::MemCmpExpansionOptions
+AArch64TTIImpl::enableMemCmpExpansion(bool OptSize, bool IsZeroCmp) const {
+  TTI::MemCmpExpansionOptions Options;
+  Options.AllowOverlappingLoads = !ST->requiresStrictAlign();
+  Options.MaxNumLoads = TLI->getMaxExpandSizeMemcmp(OptSize);
+  Options.NumLoadsPerBlock = Options.MaxNumLoads;
+  // TODO: Though vector loads usually perform well on AArch64, in some targets
+  // they may wake up the FP unit, which raises the power consumption.  Perhaps
+  // they could be used with no holds barred (-O3).
+  Options.LoadSizes = {8, 4, 2, 1};
+  return Options;
+}
+
 int AArch64TTIImpl::getMemoryOpCost(unsigned Opcode, Type *Ty,
                                     unsigned Alignment, unsigned AddressSpace,
                                     const Instruction *I) {
   auto LT = TLI->getTypeLegalizationCost(DL, Ty);
 
   if (ST->isMisaligned128StoreSlow() && Opcode == Instruction::Store &&
       LT.second.is128BitVector() && Alignment < 16) {
     // Unaligned stores are extremely inefficient. We don't split all

llvm/test/CodeGen/AArch64/bcmp-inline-small.ll

+; RUN: llc -O2 < %s -mtriple=aarch64-linux-gnu                     | FileCheck %s --check-prefixes=CHECK,CHECKN
+; RUN: llc -O2 < %s -mtriple=aarch64-linux-gnu -mattr=strict-align | FileCheck %s --check-prefixes=CHECK,CHECKS
+
+declare i32 @bcmp(i8*, i8*, i64) nounwind readonly
+declare i32 @memcmp(i8*, i8*, i64) nounwind readonly
+
+define i1 @bcmp_b2(i8* %s1, i8* %s2) {
+entry:
+  %bcmp = call i32 @bcmp(i8* %s1, i8* %s2, i64 15)
+  %ret = icmp eq i32 %bcmp, 0
+  ret i1 %ret
+
+; CHECK-LABEL: bcmp_b2:
+; CHECK-NOT:   bl bcmp
+; CHECKN:      ldr  x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldr  x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldur x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldur x
+; CHECKS:      ldr  x
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldr  x
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldr  w
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldr  w
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldrh w
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldrh w
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldrb w
+; CHECKS-NEXT: ldrb w
+}
+
+define i1 @bcmp_bs(i8* %s1, i8* %s2) optsize {
+entry:
+  %memcmp = call i32 @memcmp(i8* %s1, i8* %s2, i64 31)
+  %ret = icmp eq i32 %memcmp, 0
+  ret i1 %ret
+
+; CHECK-LABEL: bcmp_bs:
+; CHECKN-NOT:  bl memcmp
+; CHECKN:      ldp  x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldp  x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldr  x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldr  x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldur x
+; CHECKN-NEXT: ldur x
+; CHECKS:      bl memcmp
+}