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OCaml Multicore - September 2021

Welcome to the September 2021 Multicore OCaml monthly report! This month's update along with the previous updates have been compiled by me, @ctk21, @kayceesrk and @shakthimaan. The team has been working over the past few months to finish the last few features necessary to reach feature parity with stock OCaml. We also worked closely with the core OCaml team to develop the timeline for upstreaming Multicore OCaml to stock OCaml, and have now agreed that:

OCaml 5.0 will support shared-memory parallelism through domains and direct-style concurrency through effect handlers (without syntactic support).

The new code will have to go through the usual rigorous review process of contributions to upstream OCaml, but we expect to advance the review process over the next few months.

Recap: what are effect handlers?

Below is an excerpt from "Retrofitting Effect Handlers onto OCaml":

Effect handlers provide a modular foundation for user-defined effects. The key idea is to separate the definition of the effectful operations from their interpretations, which are given by handlers of the effects. For example:

effect In_line : in_channel -> string

declares an effect In_line, which is parameterised with an input channel of type in_channel, which when performed returns a string value. A computation can perform the In_line effect without knowing how the In_line effect is implemented. This computation may be enclosed by different handlers that handle In_line differently. For example, In_line may be implemented by performing a blocking read on the input channel or performing the read asynchronously by offloading it to an event loop such as libuv, without changing the computation.

Thanks to the separation of effectful operations from their implementation, effect handlers enable new approaches to modular programming. Effect handlers are a generalisation of exception handlers, where, in addition to the effect being handled, the handler is provided with the delimited continuation of the perform site. This continuation may be used to resume the suspended computation later. This enables non-local control-flow mechanisms such as resumable exceptions, lightweight threads, coroutines, generators and asynchronous I/O to be composably expressed.

The implementation of effect handlers in OCaml are single-shot -- that is, a continuation can be resumed only once, and must be explicitly discontinued if not used. This restriction makes for easier reasoning about control flow in the presence of mutable data structures, and also allows for a high performance implementation.

You can read more about effect handlers in OCaml in the full paper.

Why is there no syntactic support for effect handlers in OCaml 5.0?

Effect handlers currently in Multicore OCaml do not ensure effect safety. That is, the compiler will not ensure that all the effects performed by the program are handled. Instead, unhandled effects lead to exceptions at runtime. Since we plan to extend OCaml with support for an effect system in the future, OCaml 5.0 will not feature the syntactic support for programming with effect handlers. Instead, we expose the same features through functions from the standard library, reserving the syntax decisions for when the effect system lands. The function based effect handlers is just as expressive as the current syntaxful version in Multicore OCaml. As an example, the syntax-free version of:

effect E : string 

let comp () =
  print_string "0 ";
  print_string (perform E);
  print_string "3 "
     
let main () = 
  try 
    comp () 
  with effect E k -> 
    print_string "1 "; 
    continue k "2 ";  
    print_string “4 "

will be:

type _ eff += E : string eff
     
let comp () = 
  print_string "0 "; 
  print_string (perform E); 
  print_string "3 "
     
let main () =
  try_with comp () 
  { effc = fun e -> 
      match e with 
      | E -> Some (fun k ->  
          print_string "1 ";
          continue k "2 "; 
          print_string “4 “)
      | e -> None }

One can imagine writing a ppx extension that enable programmers to write code that is close to the earlier version.

Which opam switch should I use today?

The 4.12+domains opam switch has all the features that will go into OCaml 5.0, including the effect-handlers-as-functions. The exact module under which the functions go will likely change by 5.0, but the basic form should remain the same.

The 4.12+domains+effects opam switch will be preserved, but the syntax will not be upstreamed. This switch is mainly useful to try out the examples of OCaml effect handlers in the academic literature.

To learn more about programming using this effect system, see the eio library and this recent talk. In the next few weeks, the eio library will be ported to 4.12+domains to use the function based effect handlers so that it is ready for OCaml 5.0.

Onto the September 21 update

A number of enhancements have been merged to improve the thread safety of the stdlib, improve the test suite coverage, along with the usual bug fixes. The documentation for the ecosystem projects has been updated for readabilty, grammar and consistency. The sandmark-nightly web service is currently being Dockerized to be deployed for visualising and analysing benchmark results. The Sandmark 2.0-beta branch is also released with the 2.0 features, and is available for testing and feedback.

We would like to acknowledge the following people for their contribution:

  • @lingmar (Linnea Ingmar) for reporting a segmentation fault in 4.12.0+domains at caml_shared_try_alloc.
  • @dhil (Daniel Hillerström) provided a patch to remove drop_continuation in the compiler sources.
  • @nilsbecker (Nils Becker) reported a crash with 14 cores when using Task.pool management.
  • @cjen1 (Chris Jensen) observed and used ulimit to fix a Unix.ENOMEM error when trying out the Eio README example.
  • @anuragsoni (Anurag Soni) has contributed an async HTTP benchmark for retro-httpaf-bench.

As always, the Multicore OCaml updates are listed first, which are then followed by the updates from the ecosystem tools and libraries. The Sandmark-nightly work-in-progress and the Sandmark benchmarking tasks are finally listed for your reference.

Multicore OCaml

Ongoing

Thread Safe

Segmentation Fault

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#639 Segfaults in GC

    An ongoing investigation on the segmentation fault caused at caml_shared_try_alloc in 4.12.0+domains as reported by @lingmar (Linnea Ingmar) .

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#646 Coq segfaults during build

    The Coq proof assistant results in a segmentation fault when run with Multicore OCaml, and a new tarball has been provided for testing.

Test Suite

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#640 GitHub Actions for Windows

    The GitHub Actions have been updated to run the Multicore OCaml test suite on Windows.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#641 Get the multicore testsuite runner to parity with stock OCaml

    The Multicore disabled tests need to be reviewed to see if they can be re-enabled, and also run them in parallel, similar to trunk.

Sundries

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#637 caml_page_table_lookup is not available in ocaml-multicore

    The ancien package uses Is_in_heap_or_young macro which internally uses caml_page_table_lookup that is not implemented yet in Multicore OCaml.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#653 Drop drop_continuation

    A PR contributed by @dhil (Daniel Hillerström) to remove drop_continuation since clone_continuation has also been removed.

Completed

Upstream

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#631 Don't raise asynchronous exceptions from signals in caml_alloc C functions

    A PR that prevents asynchronous exceptions being raised from signal handlers, and avoids polling for pending signals from caml_alloc_* calls from C.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#638 Add some injectivity annotations to the standard library

    The injectivity annotations have been backported to stdlib from 4.12.0 in order to compile stdcompat with Multicore OCaml.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#642 Remove the remanents of page table functionality

    Page tables are not used in Multicore OCaml, and the respective macro and function definitions have been removed.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#643 Core_kernel minor words report are off

    The report of allocated words are skewed because the young_ptr and young_end are defined as char *. The PR to change them to value * has now been merged.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#652 Make young_start/end/ptr pointers to value

    The young_start, young_end, and young_ptr use in Multicore OCaml has been updated to value * instead of char * to align with trunk.

Backports

Thread Safe

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#630 Make signals safe for Multicore

    The signals implementation has been overhauled in Multicore OCaml with clear and correct semantics.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#635 Make lib-str domain safe

    The PR moves the use of global variables in str to thread local storage. A test case that does str computations in parallel has also been added.

Effect Handlers

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#650 Add primitives necessary for exposing effect handlers as functions

    The inclusion of primitives to facilitate updates to 4.12+domains to continue to work with changes from 4.12+domains+effects.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#651 Expose deep and shallow handlers as functions

    The PR exposes deep and shallow handlers as functions in the Obj module. It also removes the ability to clone continuations.

Sundries

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#633 Error building 4.12.0+domains with no-flat-float-arrays

    The linker error has been fixed in PR#644.

  • ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#647 Improving Multicore's issue template

    The Multicore OCaml bug report template has been improved with sections for Describe the issue, To reproduce, Multicore OCaml build version, Did you try running it with the debug runtime and heap verificiation ON?, and Backtrace.

Ecosystem

Ongoing

  • ocaml-multicore/domainslib#43 Possible bug in Task.pool management

    A segmentation fault on Task.pool management when using 14 cores as reported by @nilsbecker (Nils Becker).

  • ocaml-multicore/multicore-opam#59 Fix batteries after ocaml-multicore/ocaml-multicore#514

    Update the batteries.3.3.0+multicore opam file for batteries-included with the correct src URL.

  • ocaml-multicore/multicore-opam#60 Multicore domains+effects language server does not work with VS Code

    A Request textDocument/hover failed error shows up with VS Code when using Multicore domains+effects language server.

  • ocaml-multicore/eio#81 Is IO prioritisation possible?

    A query on IO prioritisation and on scheduling of fibres for consensus systems.

Completed
Build

  • ocaml-multicore/eventlog-tools Use ocaml/setup-ocaml@v2

    The GitHub workflows have now been updated to use 4.12.x ocaml-compiler and ocaml/setup-ocaml@v2 in .github/workflows/main.yml file.

  • ocaml-multicore/tezos#3 Add cron job and run tests

    The CI Dockerfile and GitHub workflows have been changed to run the tests periodically for Tezos on Multicore OCaml.

  • ocaml-multicore/tezos#4 Run cronjob daily

    The GitHub cronjob is now scheduled to run daily for the Tezos builds from scratch.

  • ocaml-multicore/retro-httpaf-bench#12 Dockerfile fails to build

    The issue no longer exists, and the Dockerfile now builds fine in the CI as well.

  • ocaml-multicore/eio#80 ENOMEM with README example

    @cjen1 (Chris Jensen) reported a Unix.ENOMEM error that prevented the following README example code snippet from execution. Using ulimit with the a smaller memory size fixes the same.

    #require "eio_main";;
open Eio.Std;;

let main ~stdout = Eio.Flow.copy_string "hello World" stdout
Eio_main.run @@ fun env -> main ~stdout:(Eio.Stdenv.stdout env)
;;
Documentation

  • ocaml-multicore/parallel-programming-in-multicore-ocaml#10 Edited for flow/syntax/consistency

    The Parallel Programming in Multicore OCaml chapter has been reviewed and updated for consistency, syntax flow and readability.

  • ocaml-multicore/eio#79 Initial edits for consistency, formatting and clarity

    The README in the Eio project has been updated for consistency, formatting and readability.

  • The ocaml2020-workshop-parallel README has been updated with reference links to books, videos, project repository, and the OCaml Multicore wiki.

Benchmarks

  • ocaml-multicore/retro-httpaf-bench#15 Optimise Go code

    The nethttp-go/httpserv.go Go benchmark now uses Write instead of fmt.Fprintf with removal of yield() for optimization.

  • ocaml-multicore/retro-httpaf-bench Add an async HTTP benchmark

    @anuragsoni (Anurag Soni) has contributed an async HTTP benchmark that was run inside Docker on a 4-core i7-8559 CPU at 2.70 GHz with 1000 connections and 60 second runs.

    retro-httpaf-bench-16-performance|690x460

Benchmarking

Sandmark-nightly

Ongoing

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#10 Dockerize sandmark-nightly

    The sandmark-nightly service needs to be dockerized to be able to run on multiple machines.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#11 Refactor the sandmark-nightly notebooks

    The code in the sandmark-nightly notebooks need to be refactored and modularized so that they can be reused as a library.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#12 Normalization graphs (with greater than two benchmarks) needs to be fixed

    The normalization graphs only produce one coloured bar group even if there are more than two benchmarks. It needs to show more than one coloured graph when compared with the baseline.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#13 Store the logs from the nightly runs along with the results

    The nightly run logs can be stored as they are useful for debugging any failures.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#14 Add best-fit variant to sequential benchmarks

    The sandmark-nightly runs should include the best-fit allocator as it is better than the next-fit allocator. The best-fit allocator can be enabled using the following command:

    $ OCAMLRUNPARAM="a=2" ./a.out

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#16 Cubicle and Coq benchmarks are missing from the latest navajo nightly runs

    The UI for the sequential benchmarks fail to load normalized graphs because of missing Cubicle and Coq benchmark .bench files.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark-nightly#17 Navajo runs are on stale Sandmark

    The Sandmark deployed on navajo needs to be updated to the latest Sandmark, and the git pull is failing due to uncommitted changes to the Makefile.

Sandmark

Ongoing

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark#248 Coq fails to build

    A new Coq tarball to build with Multicore OCaml is now available for testing at coq-multicore-2021-09-24.

  • Sandmark 2.0-beta

    The Sandmark 2.0-beta branch is now available for testing. It includes new features such as package override option, adding meta-information to the benchmark results, running multiple iterations, classification of benchmarks, user configuration, and simplifies package dependency management. You can test the branch for the following OCaml compiler variants:

    • 4.12.0+domains
    • 4.12.0+stock
    • 4.14.0+trunk
    $ git clone https://github.com/ocaml-bench/sandmark.github
$ cd sandmark
$ git checkout 2.0-beta

$ make clean; TAG='"run_in_ci"' make run_config_filtered.json
$ RUN_CONFIG_JSON=run_config_filtered.json make ocaml-versions/4.12.0+domains.bench

$ make clean; TAG='"run_in_ci"' make run_config_filtered.json
$ RUN_CONFIG_JSON=run_config_filtered.json make ocaml-versions/4.12.0+stock.bench

$ make clean; TAG='"run_in_ci"' make run_config_filtered.json
$ RUN_CONFIG_JSON=run_config_filtered.json make ocaml-versions/4.14.0+trunk.bench

$ make clean; TAG='"macro_bench"' make multicore_parallel_run_config_filtered.json
$ RUN_BENCH_TARGET=run_orunchrt BUILD_BENCH_TARGET=multibench_parallel RUN_CONFIG_JSON=multicore_parallel_run_config_filtered.json make ocaml-versions/4.12.0+domains.bench

    Please report any issues that you face in our GitHub project page.

Completed

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark#251 Update dependencies to work with 4.14.0+trunk

    The Sandmark master branch dependencies have now been updated to build with 4.14.0+trunk.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark#253 Remove Domain.Sync.poll() from parallel benchmarks

    The Domain.Sync.poll() function call is now deprecated and the same has been removed from the parallel benchmarks in Sandmark.

  • ocaml-bench/sandmark#254 Disable sandboxing

    The --disable-sandboxing option is now passed as default to opam when setting up the local _opam directory for Sandmark builds.

We would like to thank all the OCaml users, developers and contributors in the community for their continued support to the project. Stay safe!

Acronyms

  • CI: Continuous Integration
  • CPU: Central Processing Unit
  • GC: Garbage Collector
  • HTTP: Hypertext Transfer Protocol
  • IO: Input/Output
  • OPAM: OCaml Package Manager
  • PR: Pull Request
  • UI: User Interface
  • URL: Uniform Resource Locator
  • VS: Visual Studio