>> For example, one execution of QEMU produced the following log:
>>
>> $ stap qemu-timing.stp
>> 0.000 Start
>> 0.036 Run
>> 0.038 BIOS post
>> 0.180 BIOS int 19
>> 0.181 BIOS boot OS
>> 0.181 LinuxBoot copy kernel
>> 1.371 LinuxBoot copy initrd
>
> Yeah, there was a thread a bit ago about the performance of the interface to
read the kernel/initrd. I think at it was using single byte access instructions
and there were patches to use string accessors instead? I can't remember where
that threaded ended up.
IIRC we're already using string accessors, but are still slow. Richard had a
nice patch cooked up to basically have the fw_cfg interface be able to DMA its
data to the guest. I like the idea. Avi did not.
And yes, bad -kernel performance does hurt in some workloads. A lot.