gem5 Bench

A wrapper for simulation with gem5

gem5 Basic

• Getting start with Learning gem5

Host machine requirements

• At least 32G DRAM for full system mode with spec2006/spec2017 installed

Install Dependencies Packages

sudo apt install build-essential git m4 scons zlib1g zlib1g-dev libprotobuf-dev protobuf-compiler libprotoc-dev libgoogle-perftools-dev python-dev python gcc-multilib g++multilib

Install KVM

Following instruction on this page. Add user to group kvm

sudo adduser `whoami` kvm

Reboot to make this setting works

Install QEMU, for creating gem5 full system image

sudo apt-get install qemu-kvm qemu virt-manager virt-viewer libvirt-bin virtinst kpartx

Install gcc for ARM if want to build linux kernel for Aarch64

sudo apt-get install gcc-aarch64-linux-gnu device-tree-compiler

Install Docker

Following instruction on this page. Add user to group docker

sudo usermod -aG docker ${USER}

To apply the new group membership, log out of the server and back in, or type the following:

su - ${USER}

Test docker

docker run hello-world

Build SPEC2006 for gem5 SE mode

First, build spec2006 on native machine

make build_spec2006_$(ISA)

Second, run spec2006 once on native machine for gem5 do not implement mkdir syscall, some tmp/result dir need to be setup firstly

make run_spec2006_$(ISA)

Run SPEC2006 on gem5 SE mode

First, list all available benchmark and workload

make list-wrkld

Run benchmark case

make $(benchname) ISA=$(ISA) WRKLD=$(WORKLOAD)

Build Linux Kernel for gem5 Full System Mode

Install Ubuntu 16.04 to disk image for gem5 full system mode

make build_img_x86

Build Linux kernel, you can define you kernel in linux_configs/config-.cfg

make build_kernel_x86

Install tools and benchmark to disk image

make install_spec_x86

If your host kernel is different from the guest, recompile of spec2006 may need. Try to recompile it on qemu

make run_qemu_x86

Once logined, compile the benchmark with this command

export M5_CPU2006=<path_to_CPU2006>
make setup_spec2006_X86

Try run benchmark on qemu, and make sure benchmark exists without error

sh ./m5tools/400.xxxxxx.sh

Run Benchmark on gem5 with Full System Mode

make run_gem5_x86 CMD=./m5tools/<benchmark>.sh

Log of benchmark will be wrote to ./m5out/*.out

TODO

• Add McPAT flow for power analysis
  • xml templete for McPAT
  • Configure more detail O3CPU on gem5 in fs_run.py
  • Add power analysis flow in Makefile
• Add Full system image making flow for ARM
• Output redirect not work in SE mode
• Auto login in tty mode, which may help gem5 FS mode run faster?

Trouble Shooting

gem5 is killed by system

Double confirm this issue by

grep -i 'killed process' /var/log/kern.log

Workaround

sudo su
echo 1 > /proc/sys/vm/overcommit_memory

Documentation here