In design of ALSA PCM core, status and control data for runtime of ALSA
PCM substream are shared between kernel/user spaces by page frame
mapping with read-only attribute. Both of hardware-side and
application-side position on PCM buffer are maintained as a part of
the status data. In a view of ALSA PCM application, these two positions
can be updated by executing ioctl(2) with some commands.

There's an event of tracepoint for hardware-side position; 'hwptr'.
On the other hand, no events for application-side position. This commit
adds a new event for this purpose; 'applptr'. When the application-side
position is changed in kernel space, this event is probed with useful
information for developers.

I note that the event is not probed for all of ALSA PCM applications, When
applications are written by read/write programming scenario, the event is
surely probed. The applications execute ioctl(2) with
SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_[READ|WRITE][N/I]_FRAMES to read/write any PCM frame, then
ALSA PCM core updates the application-side position in kernel land.
However, when applications are written by mmap programming scenario, if
maintaining the application side position in kernel space accurately,
applications should voluntarily execute ioctl(2) with
SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR to commit the number of handled PCM frames. If
not voluntarily, the application-side position is not changed, thus the
added event is not probed.

There's a loophole, using architectures to which ALSA PCM core judges
non cache coherent. In this case, the status and control data is not mapped
into processe's VMA for any applications. Userland library, alsa-lib, is
programmed for this case. It executes ioctl(2) with
SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR command every time to requiring the status and
control data.

ARM is such an architecture. Below is an example with serial sound interface
(ssi) on i.mx6 quad core SoC. I use v4.1 kernel released by fsl-community
with patches from VIA Tech. Inc. for VAB820, and my backport patches for
relevant features for this patchset. I use Ubuntu 17.04 from
ports.ubuntu.com as user land for armhf architecture.

$ aplay -v -M -D hw:imx6vab820sgtl5,0 /dev/urandom -f S16_LE -r 48000 --period-size=128 --buffer-size=256
Playing raw data '/dev/urandom' : Signed 16 bit Little Endian, Rate 48000 Hz, Mono
Hardware PCM card 0 'imx6-vab820-sgtl5000' device 0 subdevice 0
Its setup is:
  stream       : PLAYBACK
  access       : MMAP_INTERLEAVED
  format       : S16_LE
  subformat    : STD
  channels     : 1
  rate         : 48000
  exact rate   : 48000 (48000/1)
  msbits       : 16
  buffer_size  : 256
  period_size  : 128
  period_time  : 2666
  tstamp_mode  : NONE
  tstamp_type  : MONOTONIC
  period_step  : 1
  avail_min    : 128
  period_event : 0
  start_threshold  : 256
  stop_threshold   : 256
  silence_threshold: 0
  silence_size : 0
  boundary     : 1073741824
  appl_ptr     : 0
  hw_ptr       : 0
mmap_area[0] = 0x76f98000,0,16 (16)

$ trace-cmd record -e snd_pcm:hwptr -e snd_pcm:applptr
$ trace-cmd report
...
60.208495: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1792, curr=1792, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.208633: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1792, curr=1792, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.210022: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: IRQ: pos=128, old=1536, base=1536, period=128, buf=256
60.210202: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1792, curr=1792, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.210344: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: POS: pos=128, old=1664, base=1536, period=128, buf=256
60.210348: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1792, curr=1792, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.210486: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1792, curr=1792, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.210626: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1792, curr=1920, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.211002: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=1920, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.211142: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: POS: pos=128, old=1664, base=1536, period=128, buf=256
60.211146: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=1920, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.211287: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=1920, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.212690: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: IRQ: pos=0, old=1664, base=1536, period=128, buf=256
60.212866: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=1920, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.212999: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: POS: pos=0, old=1792, base=1792, period=128, buf=256
60.213003: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=1920, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.213135: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=1920, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.213276: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=1920, curr=2048, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.213654: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2048, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.213796: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: POS: pos=0, old=1792, base=1792, period=128, buf=256
60.213800: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2048, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.213937: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2048, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
60.215356: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: IRQ: pos=128, old=1792, base=1792, period=128, buf=256
60.215542: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2048, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.215679: hwptr:   pcmC0D0p/sub0: POS: pos=128, old=1920, base=1792, period=128, buf=256
60.215683: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2048, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.215813: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2048, avail=128, period=128, buf=256
60.215947: applptr: pcmC0D0p/sub0: prev=2048, curr=2176, avail=0, period=128, buf=256
...

We can surely see 'applptr' event is probed even if the application run
for mmap programming scenario ('-M' option and 'hw' plugin). Below is a
result of strace:

02:44:15.886382 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.887203 poll([{fd=4, events=POLLOUT|POLLERR|POLLNVAL}], 1, -1) = 1 ([{fd=4, revents=POLLOUT}])
02:44:15.887471 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.887637 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.887805 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.887969 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.888132 read(3, "..."..., 256) = 256
02:44:15.889040 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.889221 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.889431 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.889606 poll([{fd=4, events=POLLOUT|POLLERR|POLLNVAL}], 1, -1) = 1 ([{fd=4, revents=POLLOUT}])
02:44:15.889833 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.889998 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.890164 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.891048 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.891228 read(3, "..."..., 256) = 256
02:44:15.891497 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.891661 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.891829 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0
02:44:15.891991 poll([{fd=4, events=POLLOUT|POLLERR|POLLNVAL}], 1, -1) = 1 ([{fd=4, revents=POLLOUT}])
02:44:15.893007 ioctl(4, SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR, 0x56a32b30) = 0

We can see 7 calls of ioctl(2) with SNDRV_PCM_IOCTL_SYNC_PTR per loop with
call of poll(2). 128 PCM frames are transferred per loop of one poll(2),
because the PCM substream is configured with S16_LE format and 1 channel
(2 byte * 1 * 128 = 256 bytes). This equals to the size of period of PCM
buffer. Comparing to the probed data, one of the 7 calls of ioctl(2) is
actually used to commit the number of copied PCM frames to kernel space.
The other calls are just used to check runtime status of PCM substream;
e.g. XRUN.

The tracepoint event is useful to investigate this case. I note that below
modules are related to the above sample.

 * snd-soc-dummy.ko
 * snd-soc-imx-sgtl5000.ko
 * snd-soc-fsl-ssi.ko
 * snd-soc-imx-pcm-dma.ko
 * snd-soc-sgtl5000.ko

My additional note is lock acquisition. The event is probed under acquiring
PCM stream lock. This means that calculation in the event is free from
any hardware events.
Signed-off-by: Takashi Sakamoto <o-takashi@sakamocchi.jp>
Signed-off-by: Takashi Iwai <tiwai@suse.de>