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* [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()?
@ 2020-07-01 18:50 Markus Wichmann
  2020-07-01 20:44 ` Rich Felker
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 5+ messages in thread
From: Markus Wichmann @ 2020-07-01 18:50 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: musl

Hi all,

I noticed something while reading code today: Near the end of qsort(),
we have this gem:

shl(p, 2);
pshift -= 2;
p[0] ^= 7;
shr(p, 1);

Now, I don't know if I am missing something, but don't the shl and the
shr partially cancel out? Isn't this the same as

shl(p, 1);
p[0] ^= 3;

As it is, it isn't wrong, just weird.

Ciao,
Markus

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 5+ messages in thread

* Re: [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()?
  2020-07-01 18:50 [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()? Markus Wichmann
@ 2020-07-01 20:44 ` Rich Felker
  2020-07-01 21:23   ` Valentin Ochs
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 5+ messages in thread
From: Rich Felker @ 2020-07-01 20:44 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: musl; +Cc: Valentin Ochs

On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 08:50:26PM +0200, Markus Wichmann wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I noticed something while reading code today: Near the end of qsort(),
> we have this gem:
> 
> shl(p, 2);
> pshift -= 2;
> p[0] ^= 7;
> shr(p, 1);
> 
> Now, I don't know if I am missing something, but don't the shl and the
> shr partially cancel out? Isn't this the same as
> 
> shl(p, 1);
> p[0] ^= 3;
> 
> As it is, it isn't wrong, just weird.

Assuming non-overflow, I think they're equivalent (also assuming you
keep the pshift-=2). I've CC'd the original author but we've not been
in touch for a long time so I don't know whether to expect a response.
I don't have any insight on why it was done this way.

Rich

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 5+ messages in thread

* Re: [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()?
  2020-07-01 20:44 ` Rich Felker
@ 2020-07-01 21:23   ` Valentin Ochs
  2020-07-02 14:44     ` Markus Wichmann
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 5+ messages in thread
From: Valentin Ochs @ 2020-07-01 21:23 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: musl

On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 04:44:56PM -0400, Rich Felker wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 08:50:26PM +0200, Markus Wichmann wrote:
> > Hi all,
> > 
> > I noticed something while reading code today: Near the end of qsort(),
> > we have this gem:
> > 
> > shl(p, 2);
> > pshift -= 2;
> > p[0] ^= 7;
> > shr(p, 1);
> > 
> > Now, I don't know if I am missing something, but don't the shl and the
> > shr partially cancel out? Isn't this the same as
> > 
> > shl(p, 1);
> > p[0] ^= 3;
> > 
> > As it is, it isn't wrong, just weird.
> 
> Assuming non-overflow, I think they're equivalent (also assuming you
> keep the pshift-=2).

Yes, it looks that way. I'm afraid I don't have any further insight -
it's been quite a while since I thought about the qsort code, and I've
not been doing much work on algorithms over the last couple of years.
The only thing I can think of is that one could figure out which
behaviour with regard to overflow in shl() should be the valid one. I
suspect that replacing it would be valid and this is some transformation
I did while implementing smoothsort without realizing that this can be
simplified.

Cheers,
Valentin


^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 5+ messages in thread

* Re: [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()?
  2020-07-01 21:23   ` Valentin Ochs
@ 2020-07-02 14:44     ` Markus Wichmann
  2020-07-06 22:01       ` Rich Felker
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 5+ messages in thread
From: Markus Wichmann @ 2020-07-02 14:44 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: musl

On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 11:23:09PM +0200, Valentin Ochs wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 04:44:56PM -0400, Rich Felker wrote:
> > On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 08:50:26PM +0200, Markus Wichmann wrote:
> > > Hi all,
> > >
> > > I noticed something while reading code today: Near the end of qsort(),
> > > we have this gem:
> > >
> > > shl(p, 2);
> > > pshift -= 2;
> > > p[0] ^= 7;
> > > shr(p, 1);
> > >
> > > Now, I don't know if I am missing something, but don't the shl and the
> > > shr partially cancel out? Isn't this the same as
> > >
> > > shl(p, 1);
> > > p[0] ^= 3;
> > >
> > > As it is, it isn't wrong, just weird.
> >
> > Assuming non-overflow, I think they're equivalent (also assuming you
> > keep the pshift-=2).
>
> Yes, it looks that way. I'm afraid I don't have any further insight -
> it's been quite a while since I thought about the qsort code, and I've
> not been doing much work on algorithms over the last couple of years.
> The only thing I can think of is that one could figure out which
> behaviour with regard to overflow in shl() should be the valid one. I
> suspect that replacing it would be valid and this is some transformation
> I did while implementing smoothsort without realizing that this can be
> simplified.
>
> Cheers,
> Valentin
>

Overflow on shl() is completely impossible. To overflow a shl(p, 2), we
would need the penultimate bit in p to be set. Every bit in p stands in for
a tree of that order, so if bit n is set, the heap contains a tree with
a number of elements equal to the n'th Leonardo number.

I don't know how big the Leonardo number corresponding to the
penultimate bit is, but I do know that halfway through the upper word
(wasn't the factor something like 1.44 or so?), the Leonardo numbers get
too big to be contained in a machine word. Meaning that tree would be
way too large to be addressed.

I concur that this looks like a missed optimization opportunity, and not
a deliberate design decision.

Ciao,
Markus

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 5+ messages in thread

* Re: [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()?
  2020-07-02 14:44     ` Markus Wichmann
@ 2020-07-06 22:01       ` Rich Felker
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 5+ messages in thread
From: Rich Felker @ 2020-07-06 22:01 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: musl

On Thu, Jul 02, 2020 at 04:44:47PM +0200, Markus Wichmann wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 11:23:09PM +0200, Valentin Ochs wrote:
> > On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 04:44:56PM -0400, Rich Felker wrote:
> > > On Wed, Jul 01, 2020 at 08:50:26PM +0200, Markus Wichmann wrote:
> > > > Hi all,
> > > >
> > > > I noticed something while reading code today: Near the end of qsort(),
> > > > we have this gem:
> > > >
> > > > shl(p, 2);
> > > > pshift -= 2;
> > > > p[0] ^= 7;
> > > > shr(p, 1);
> > > >
> > > > Now, I don't know if I am missing something, but don't the shl and the
> > > > shr partially cancel out? Isn't this the same as
> > > >
> > > > shl(p, 1);
> > > > p[0] ^= 3;
> > > >
> > > > As it is, it isn't wrong, just weird.
> > >
> > > Assuming non-overflow, I think they're equivalent (also assuming you
> > > keep the pshift-=2).
> >
> > Yes, it looks that way. I'm afraid I don't have any further insight -
> > it's been quite a while since I thought about the qsort code, and I've
> > not been doing much work on algorithms over the last couple of years.
> > The only thing I can think of is that one could figure out which
> > behaviour with regard to overflow in shl() should be the valid one. I
> > suspect that replacing it would be valid and this is some transformation
> > I did while implementing smoothsort without realizing that this can be
> > simplified.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Valentin
> >
> 
> Overflow on shl() is completely impossible. To overflow a shl(p, 2), we
> would need the penultimate bit in p to be set. Every bit in p stands in for
> a tree of that order, so if bit n is set, the heap contains a tree with
> a number of elements equal to the n'th Leonardo number.
> 
> I don't know how big the Leonardo number corresponding to the
> penultimate bit is, but I do know that halfway through the upper word
> (wasn't the factor something like 1.44 or so?), the Leonardo numbers get
> too big to be contained in a machine word. Meaning that tree would be
> way too large to be addressed.
> 
> I concur that this looks like a missed optimization opportunity, and not
> a deliberate design decision.

Indeed, I don't believe overflow is possible here; I just mentioned it
for completeness. I think the change proposed here is correct but I'll
hold off on touching it til after release since it's not fixing a bug,
just a minor missed simplification.

Rich

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 5+ messages in thread

end of thread, other threads:[~2020-07-06 22:02 UTC | newest]

Thread overview: 5+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2020-07-01 18:50 [musl] Superfluous shift in qsort()? Markus Wichmann
2020-07-01 20:44 ` Rich Felker
2020-07-01 21:23   ` Valentin Ochs
2020-07-02 14:44     ` Markus Wichmann
2020-07-06 22:01       ` Rich Felker

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