CPU2017 Flag Description
NEC Corporation Express5800/T110j-S (Intel Xeon E-2236)
Copyright © 2016 Intel Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
Base Portability Flags
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
![[suite]](https://www.spec.org/auto/cpu2017/images/suite.png)
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
-
- -convert big_endian
![[user]](https://www.spec.org/auto/cpu2017/images/user.png)
- FPORTABILITY
-
Specifies that the format will be big endian for INTEGER*1, INTEGER*2, INTEGER*4, or INTEGER*8, and big endian IEEE floating-point for REAL*4, REAL*8, REAL*16, COMPLEX*8,
COMPLEX*16, or COMPLEX*32.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
-
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
-
- -DSPEC_LP64
- PORTABILITY
-
This option is used to indicate that the host system's integers are 32-bits
wide, and longs and pointers are 64-bits wide. Not all benchmarks
recognize this macro, but the preferred practice for data model selection
applies the flags to all benchmarks; this flag description is a placeholder
for those benchmarks that do not recognize this macro.
Base Optimization Flags
-
- -xCORE-AVX2
- COPTIMIZE
-
Code is optimized for Intel(R) processors with support for AVX2 instructions.
The resulting code may contain unconditional use of features that are not supported
on other processors. This option also enables new optimizations in addition to
Intel processor-specific optimizations including advanced data layout and code
restructuring optimizations to improve memory accesses for Intel processors.
Do not use this option if you are executing a program on a processor that
is not an Intel processor. If you use this option on a non-compatible processor
to compile the main program (in Fortran) or the function main() in C/C++, the
program will display a fatal run-time error if they are executed on unsupported
processors.
-
-
- -O3
- COPTIMIZE
-
Enables O2 optimizations plus more aggressive optimizations,
such as prefetching, scalar replacement, and loop and memory
access transformations. Enables optimizations for maximum speed,
such as:
- Loop unrolling, including instruction scheduling
- Code replication to eliminate branches
- Padding the size of certain power-of-two arrays to allow
more efficient cache use.
On IA-32 and Intel EM64T processors, when O3 is used with options
-ax or -x (Linux) or with options /Qax or /Qx (Windows), the compiler
performs more aggressive data dependency analysis than for O2, which
may result in longer compilation times.
The O3 optimizations may not cause higher performance unless loop and
memory access transformations take place. The optimizations may slow
down code in some cases compared to O2 optimizations.
The O3 option is recommended for applications that have loops that heavily
use floating-point calculations and process large data sets.
- Includes:
-
- -no-prec-div
- COPTIMIZE
-
(disable/enable[default] -prec-div)
-no-prec-div enables optimizations that give slightly less precise results
than full IEEE division.
When you specify -no-prec-div along with some optimizations, such as
-xN and -xB (Linux) or /QxN and /QxB (Windows),
the compiler may change floating-point division computations into
multiplication by the reciprocal of the denominator.
For example, A/B is computed as A * (1/B) to improve the speed of the
computation.
However, sometimes the value produced by this transformation is
not as accurate as full IEEE division. When it is important to have fully
precise IEEE division, do not use -no-prec-div.
This will enable the default -prec-div and the result will be more accurate,
with some loss of performance.
-
-
-
-
- -xCORE-AVX2
- CXXOPTIMIZE
-
Code is optimized for Intel(R) processors with support for AVX2 instructions.
The resulting code may contain unconditional use of features that are not supported
on other processors. This option also enables new optimizations in addition to
Intel processor-specific optimizations including advanced data layout and code
restructuring optimizations to improve memory accesses for Intel processors.
Do not use this option if you are executing a program on a processor that
is not an Intel processor. If you use this option on a non-compatible processor
to compile the main program (in Fortran) or the function main() in C/C++, the
program will display a fatal run-time error if they are executed on unsupported
processors.
-
-
- -O3
- CXXOPTIMIZE
-
Enables O2 optimizations plus more aggressive optimizations,
such as prefetching, scalar replacement, and loop and memory
access transformations. Enables optimizations for maximum speed,
such as:
- Loop unrolling, including instruction scheduling
- Code replication to eliminate branches
- Padding the size of certain power-of-two arrays to allow
more efficient cache use.
On IA-32 and Intel EM64T processors, when O3 is used with options
-ax or -x (Linux) or with options /Qax or /Qx (Windows), the compiler
performs more aggressive data dependency analysis than for O2, which
may result in longer compilation times.
The O3 optimizations may not cause higher performance unless loop and
memory access transformations take place. The optimizations may slow
down code in some cases compared to O2 optimizations.
The O3 option is recommended for applications that have loops that heavily
use floating-point calculations and process large data sets.
- Includes:
-
- -no-prec-div
- CXXOPTIMIZE
-
(disable/enable[default] -prec-div)
-no-prec-div enables optimizations that give slightly less precise results
than full IEEE division.
When you specify -no-prec-div along with some optimizations, such as
-xN and -xB (Linux) or /QxN and /QxB (Windows),
the compiler may change floating-point division computations into
multiplication by the reciprocal of the denominator.
For example, A/B is computed as A * (1/B) to improve the speed of the
computation.
However, sometimes the value produced by this transformation is
not as accurate as full IEEE division. When it is important to have fully
precise IEEE division, do not use -no-prec-div.
This will enable the default -prec-div and the result will be more accurate,
with some loss of performance.
-
-
-
-
- -xCORE-AVX2
- FOPTIMIZE
-
Code is optimized for Intel(R) processors with support for AVX2 instructions.
The resulting code may contain unconditional use of features that are not supported
on other processors. This option also enables new optimizations in addition to
Intel processor-specific optimizations including advanced data layout and code
restructuring optimizations to improve memory accesses for Intel processors.
Do not use this option if you are executing a program on a processor that
is not an Intel processor. If you use this option on a non-compatible processor
to compile the main program (in Fortran) or the function main() in C/C++, the
program will display a fatal run-time error if they are executed on unsupported
processors.
-
-
- -O3
- FOPTIMIZE
-
Enables O2 optimizations plus more aggressive optimizations,
such as prefetching, scalar replacement, and loop and memory
access transformations. Enables optimizations for maximum speed,
such as:
- Loop unrolling, including instruction scheduling
- Code replication to eliminate branches
- Padding the size of certain power-of-two arrays to allow
more efficient cache use.
On IA-32 and Intel EM64T processors, when O3 is used with options
-ax or -x (Linux) or with options /Qax or /Qx (Windows), the compiler
performs more aggressive data dependency analysis than for O2, which
may result in longer compilation times.
The O3 optimizations may not cause higher performance unless loop and
memory access transformations take place. The optimizations may slow
down code in some cases compared to O2 optimizations.
The O3 option is recommended for applications that have loops that heavily
use floating-point calculations and process large data sets.
- Includes:
-
- -no-prec-div
- FOPTIMIZE
-
(disable/enable[default] -prec-div)
-no-prec-div enables optimizations that give slightly less precise results
than full IEEE division.
When you specify -no-prec-div along with some optimizations, such as
-xN and -xB (Linux) or /QxN and /QxB (Windows),
the compiler may change floating-point division computations into
multiplication by the reciprocal of the denominator.
For example, A/B is computed as A * (1/B) to improve the speed of the
computation.
However, sometimes the value produced by this transformation is
not as accurate as full IEEE division. When it is important to have fully
precise IEEE division, do not use -no-prec-div.
This will enable the default -prec-div and the result will be more accurate,
with some loss of performance.
-
-
-
-
-
- -nostandard-realloc-lhs
- EXTRA_FOPTIMIZE
-
Option standard-realloc-lhs (the default), tells the compiler that when the left-hand side of an assignment is an allocatable object, it should be reallocated to the shape of the
right-hand side of the assignment before the assignment occurs. This is the current Fortran Standard definition. This feature may cause extra overhead at run time. This option has
the same effect as option assume realloc_lhs.
If you specify nostandard-realloc-lhs, the compiler uses the old Fortran 2003 rules when interpreting assignment statements. The left-hand side is assumed to be allocated with the
correct shape to hold the right-hand side. If it is not, incorrect behavior will occur. This option has the same effect as option assume norealloc_lhs.
-
-
- -xCORE-AVX2
- COPTIMIZE, FOPTIMIZE
-
Code is optimized for Intel(R) processors with support for AVX2 instructions.
The resulting code may contain unconditional use of features that are not supported
on other processors. This option also enables new optimizations in addition to
Intel processor-specific optimizations including advanced data layout and code
restructuring optimizations to improve memory accesses for Intel processors.
Do not use this option if you are executing a program on a processor that
is not an Intel processor. If you use this option on a non-compatible processor
to compile the main program (in Fortran) or the function main() in C/C++, the
program will display a fatal run-time error if they are executed on unsupported
processors.
-
-
- -O3
- COPTIMIZE, FOPTIMIZE
-
Enables O2 optimizations plus more aggressive optimizations,
such as prefetching, scalar replacement, and loop and memory
access transformations. Enables optimizations for maximum speed,
such as:
- Loop unrolling, including instruction scheduling
- Code replication to eliminate branches
- Padding the size of certain power-of-two arrays to allow
more efficient cache use.
On IA-32 and Intel EM64T processors, when O3 is used with options
-ax or -x (Linux) or with options /Qax or /Qx (Windows), the compiler
performs more aggressive data dependency analysis than for O2, which
may result in longer compilation times.
The O3 optimizations may not cause higher performance unless loop and
memory access transformations take place. The optimizations may slow
down code in some cases compared to O2 optimizations.
The O3 option is recommended for applications that have loops that heavily
use floating-point calculations and process large data sets.
- Includes:
-
- -no-prec-div
- COPTIMIZE, FOPTIMIZE
-
(disable/enable[default] -prec-div)
-no-prec-div enables optimizations that give slightly less precise results
than full IEEE division.
When you specify -no-prec-div along with some optimizations, such as
-xN and -xB (Linux) or /QxN and /QxB (Windows),
the compiler may change floating-point division computations into
multiplication by the reciprocal of the denominator.
For example, A/B is computed as A * (1/B) to improve the speed of the
computation.
However, sometimes the value produced by this transformation is
not as accurate as full IEEE division. When it is important to have fully
precise IEEE division, do not use -no-prec-div.
This will enable the default -prec-div and the result will be more accurate,
with some loss of performance.
-
-
-
-
-
- -nostandard-realloc-lhs
- EXTRA_FOPTIMIZE
-
Option standard-realloc-lhs (the default), tells the compiler that when the left-hand side of an assignment is an allocatable object, it should be reallocated to the shape of the
right-hand side of the assignment before the assignment occurs. This is the current Fortran Standard definition. This feature may cause extra overhead at run time. This option has
the same effect as option assume realloc_lhs.
If you specify nostandard-realloc-lhs, the compiler uses the old Fortran 2003 rules when interpreting assignment statements. The left-hand side is assumed to be allocated with the
correct shape to hold the right-hand side. If it is not, incorrect behavior will occur. This option has the same effect as option assume norealloc_lhs.
-
-
- -xCORE-AVX2
- COPTIMIZE, CXXOPTIMIZE
-
Code is optimized for Intel(R) processors with support for AVX2 instructions.
The resulting code may contain unconditional use of features that are not supported
on other processors. This option also enables new optimizations in addition to
Intel processor-specific optimizations including advanced data layout and code
restructuring optimizations to improve memory accesses for Intel processors.
Do not use this option if you are executing a program on a processor that
is not an Intel processor. If you use this option on a non-compatible processor
to compile the main program (in Fortran) or the function main() in C/C++, the
program will display a fatal run-time error if they are executed on unsupported
processors.
-
-
- -O3
- COPTIMIZE, CXXOPTIMIZE
-
Enables O2 optimizations plus more aggressive optimizations,
such as prefetching, scalar replacement, and loop and memory
access transformations. Enables optimizations for maximum speed,
such as:
- Loop unrolling, including instruction scheduling
- Code replication to eliminate branches
- Padding the size of certain power-of-two arrays to allow
more efficient cache use.
On IA-32 and Intel EM64T processors, when O3 is used with options
-ax or -x (Linux) or with options /Qax or /Qx (Windows), the compiler
performs more aggressive data dependency analysis than for O2, which
may result in longer compilation times.
The O3 optimizations may not cause higher performance unless loop and
memory access transformations take place. The optimizations may slow
down code in some cases compared to O2 optimizations.
The O3 option is recommended for applications that have loops that heavily
use floating-point calculations and process large data sets.
- Includes:
-
- -no-prec-div
- COPTIMIZE, CXXOPTIMIZE
-
(disable/enable[default] -prec-div)
-no-prec-div enables optimizations that give slightly less precise results
than full IEEE division.
When you specify -no-prec-div along with some optimizations, such as
-xN and -xB (Linux) or /QxN and /QxB (Windows),
the compiler may change floating-point division computations into
multiplication by the reciprocal of the denominator.
For example, A/B is computed as A * (1/B) to improve the speed of the
computation.
However, sometimes the value produced by this transformation is
not as accurate as full IEEE division. When it is important to have fully
precise IEEE division, do not use -no-prec-div.
This will enable the default -prec-div and the result will be more accurate,
with some loss of performance.
-
-
-
-
- -xCORE-AVX2
- COPTIMIZE, CXXOPTIMIZE, FOPTIMIZE
-
Code is optimized for Intel(R) processors with support for AVX2 instructions.
The resulting code may contain unconditional use of features that are not supported
on other processors. This option also enables new optimizations in addition to
Intel processor-specific optimizations including advanced data layout and code
restructuring optimizations to improve memory accesses for Intel processors.
Do not use this option if you are executing a program on a processor that
is not an Intel processor. If you use this option on a non-compatible processor
to compile the main program (in Fortran) or the function main() in C/C++, the
program will display a fatal run-time error if they are executed on unsupported
processors.
-
-
- -O3
- COPTIMIZE, CXXOPTIMIZE, FOPTIMIZE
-
Enables O2 optimizations plus more aggressive optimizations,
such as prefetching, scalar replacement, and loop and memory
access transformations. Enables optimizations for maximum speed,
such as:
- Loop unrolling, including instruction scheduling
- Code replication to eliminate branches
- Padding the size of certain power-of-two arrays to allow
more efficient cache use.
On IA-32 and Intel EM64T processors, when O3 is used with options
-ax or -x (Linux) or with options /Qax or /Qx (Windows), the compiler
performs more aggressive data dependency analysis than for O2, which
may result in longer compilation times.
The O3 optimizations may not cause higher performance unless loop and
memory access transformations take place. The optimizations may slow
down code in some cases compared to O2 optimizations.
The O3 option is recommended for applications that have loops that heavily
use floating-point calculations and process large data sets.
- Includes:
-
- -no-prec-div
- COPTIMIZE, CXXOPTIMIZE, FOPTIMIZE
-
(disable/enable[default] -prec-div)
-no-prec-div enables optimizations that give slightly less precise results
than full IEEE division.
When you specify -no-prec-div along with some optimizations, such as
-xN and -xB (Linux) or /QxN and /QxB (Windows),
the compiler may change floating-point division computations into
multiplication by the reciprocal of the denominator.
For example, A/B is computed as A * (1/B) to improve the speed of the
computation.
However, sometimes the value produced by this transformation is
not as accurate as full IEEE division. When it is important to have fully
precise IEEE division, do not use -no-prec-div.
This will enable the default -prec-div and the result will be more accurate,
with some loss of performance.
-
-
-
-
-
- -nostandard-realloc-lhs
- EXTRA_FOPTIMIZE
-
Option standard-realloc-lhs (the default), tells the compiler that when the left-hand side of an assignment is an allocatable object, it should be reallocated to the shape of the
right-hand side of the assignment before the assignment occurs. This is the current Fortran Standard definition. This feature may cause extra overhead at run time. This option has
the same effect as option assume realloc_lhs.
If you specify nostandard-realloc-lhs, the compiler uses the old Fortran 2003 rules when interpreting assignment statements. The left-hand side is assumed to be allocated with the
correct shape to hold the right-hand side. If it is not, incorrect behavior will occur. This option has the same effect as option assume norealloc_lhs.
-
Implicitly Included Flags
This section contains descriptions of flags that were included implicitly
by other flags, but which do not have a permanent home at SPEC.
-
- -O2
-
Enables optimizations for speed. This is the generally recommended
optimization level. This option also enables:
- Inlining of intrinsics
- Intra-file interprocedural optimizations, which include:
- inlining
- constant propagation
- forward substitution
- routine attribute propagation
- variable address-taken analysis
- dead static function elimination
- removal of unreferenced variables
- The following capabilities for performance gain:
- constant propagation
- copy propagation
- dead-code elimination
- global register allocation
- global instruction scheduling and control speculation
- loop unrolling
- optimized code selection
- partial redundancy elimination
- strength reduction/induction variable simplification
- variable renaming
- exception handling optimizations
- tail recursions
- peephole optimizations
- structure assignment lowering and optimizations
- dead store elimination
- Includes:
-
- -O1
-
Enables optimizations for speed and disables some optimizations that increase code size and affect speed.
To limit code size, this option:
- Enables global optimization; this includes data-flow analysis,
code motion, strength reduction and test replacement, split-lifetime
analysis, and instruction scheduling.
- Disables intrinsic recognition and intrinsics inlining.
The O1 option may improve performance for applications with very large
code size, many branches, and execution time not dominated by code within loops.
-O1 sets the following options:
-funroll-loops0, -fno-builtin, -mno-ieee-fp, -fomit-framepointer, -ffunction-sections, -ftz
- Includes:
-
-
-
-
-
-
- submit= MYMASK=`printf '0x%x' $((1<<$SPECCOPYNUM))`; /usr/bin/taskset $MYMASK $command
- When running multiple copies of benchmarks, the SPEC config file feature submit is used to cause individual jobs to be bound to
specific processors. This specific submit command, using taskset, is used for Linux64 systems without numactl.
Here is a brief guide to understanding the specific command which will be found in the config file:
- /usr/bin/taskset [options] [mask] [pid | command [arg] ... ]:
taskset is used to set or retreive the CPU affinity of a running
process given its PID or to launch a new COMMAND with a given CPU
affinity. The CPU affinity is represented as a bitmask, with the
lowest order bit corresponding to the first logical CPU and highest
order bit corresponding to the last logical CPU. When the taskset
returns, it is guaranteed that the given program has been scheduled
to a specific, legal CPU, as defined by the mask setting.
- [mask]: The bitmask (in hexadecimal) corresponding to a specific
SPECCOPYNUM. The specific example above, computes this mask value in the variable $MYMASK.
The value of this mask for the first copy of a
rate run will be 0x00000001, for the second copy of the rate will
be 0x00000002 etc. Thus, the first copy of the rate run will have a
CPU affinity of CPU0, the second copy will have the affinity CPU1
etc.
- $command: Program to be started, in this case, the benchmark instance to be started.
- submit= numactl --localalloc --physcpubind=$SPECCOPYNUM $command
- When running multiple copies of benchmarks, the SPEC config file feature submit is used to cause individual jobs to be bound to
specific processors. This specific submit command is used for Linux64 systems with support for numactl.
Here is a brief guide to understanding the specific command which will be found in the config file:
- syntax: numactl [--interleave=nodes] [--preferred=node] [--physcpubind=cpus] [--cpunodebind=nodes] [--membind=nodes] [--localalloc] command args ...
- numactl runs processes with a specific NUMA scheduling or memory placement policy. The policy is set for a command and inherited by all of its children.
- "--localalloc" instructs numactl to keep a process memory on the local node while "-m" specifies which node(s) to place a process memory.
- "--physcpubind" specifies which core(s) to bind the process. In this case, copy 0 is bound to processor 0 etc.
- For full details on using numactl, please refer to your Linux documentation, 'man numactl'
- numactl --interleave=all "runspec command"
- Launching a process with numactl --interleave=all sets the memory interleave policy so that memory will be allocated using round robin on nodes.
When memory cannot be allocated on the current interleave target fall back to other nodes.
- KMP_STACKSIZE
- Specify stack size to be allocated for each thread.
- KMP_AFFINITY
- Syntax: KMP_AFFINITY=[<modifier>,...]<type>[,<permute>][,<offset>]
The value for the environment variable KMP_AFFINITY affects how the threads from an auto-parallelized program are scheduled across processors.
It applies to binaries built with -qopenmp and -parallel (Linux and Mac OS X) or /Qopenmp and /Qparallel (Windows).
modifier:
granularity=fine Causes each OpenMP thread to be bound to a single thread context.
type:
compact Specifying compact assigns the OpenMP thread <n>+1 to a free thread context as close as possible to the thread context where the <n> OpenMP thread was placed.
scatter Specifying scatter distributes the threads as evenly as possible across the entire system.
permute: The permute specifier is an integer value controls which levels are most significant when sorting the machine topology map. A value for permute forces the mappings to make the specified number of most significant levels of the sort the least significant, and it inverts the order of significance.
offset: The offset specifier indicates the starting position for thread assignment.
Please see the Thread Affinity Interface article in the Intel Composer XE Documentation for more details.
- Example: KMP_AFFINITY=granularity=fine,scatter
Specifying granularity=fine selects the finest granularity level and causes each OpenMP or auto-par thread to be bound to a single thread context.
This ensures that there is only one thread per core on cores supporting HyperThreading Technology
Specifying scatter distributes the threads as evenly as possible across the entire system.
Hence a combination of these two options, will spread the threads evenly across sockets, with one thread per physical core.
- Example: KMP_AFFINITY=compact,1,0
Specifying compact will assign the n+1 thread to a free thread context as close as possible to thread n.
A default granularity=core is implied if no granularity is explicitly specified.
Specifying 1,0 sets permute and offset values of the thread assignment.
With a permute value of 1, thread n+1 is assigned to a consecutive core. With an offset of 0, the process's first thread 0 will be assigned to thread 0.
The same behavior is exhibited in a multisocket system.
- OMP_NUM_THREADS
- Sets the maximum number of threads to use for OpenMP* parallel regions if no
other value is specified in the application. This environment variable
applies to both -qopenmp and -parallel (Linux and Mac OS X) or /Qopenmp and /Qparallel (Windows).
Example syntax on a Linux system with 8 cores:
export OMP_NUM_THREADS=8
- Set stack size to unlimited
- The command "ulimit -s unlimited" is used to set the stack size limit to unlimited.
- Free the file system page cache
- The command "echo 1> /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches" is used to free up the filesystem page cache.
Red Hat Specific features
- Transparent Huge Pages
- On RedHat EL 6 and later, Transparent Hugepages increase the memory page size from 4 kilobytes to 2 megabytes. Transparent Hugepages provide significant performance advantages on systems with highly contended resources and large memory workloads.
If memory utilization is too high or memory is badly fragmented which prevents hugepages being allocated, the kernel will assign smaller 4k pages instead.
Hugepages are used by default unless the /sys/kernel/mm/redhat_transparent_hugepage/enabled field is changed from its RedHat EL6 default of 'always'.
OS Tuning
irqbalance:
Disabled through "systemctrl stop irqbalance.service". Depending on the workload involved, the irqbalance service reassigns various IRQ's to system CPUs. Though this service might help in some situations, disabling it can also help environments which need to minimize or eliminate latency to more quickly respond to events.
sched_cfs_bandwidth_slice_us (Default = 5000):
When Completely Fair Scheduler bandwidth control is in use, this parameter controls the amount of run-time (bandwidth) transferred to a run queue from the task's control group bandwidth pool. Small values allow the global bandwidth to be shared in a fine-grained manner among tasks, larger values reduce transfer overhead.
sched_migration_cost_ns (Default = 500000):
Amount of time after the last execution that a task is considered to be "cache hot" in migration decisions. A "hot" task is less likely to be migrated to another CPU, so increasing this variable reduces task migrations.
Firmware Settings
One or more of the following settings may have been set. If so, the "Platform Notes" section of the report will say so; and you can read below to find out more about what these settings mean.
Hyper-Threading (Default = Enabled):
This feature allows enabling or disabling of logical processor cores on processors supporting Intel Hyper-Threading (HT). When enabled, each physical processor core operates as two logical processor cores. When disabled, each physical core operates as only one logical processor core. Enabling this option can improve overall performance for applications that benefit from a higher processor core count.
VT-x (Default = Enabled):
When enabled, a hypervisor or operating system supporting this option can use hardware capabilities provided by Intel virtualization technology. Some hypervisors require that you enable VT-x. You can leave this set to Enabled even if you are not using a hypervisor or an operating system that uses this option.
Hardware Prefetcher (Default = Enabled):
This BIOS option allows the enabling/disabling of a processor mechanism to prefetch data into the cache according to a pattern-recognition algorithm. In some cases, setting this option to disabled may improve performance. Users should only disable this option after performing application benchmarking to verify improved performance in their environment.
Adjacent Cache Line Prefetch (Default = Enabled):
This option allows the enabling/disabling of a processor mechanism to fetch the adjacent cache line within a 128-byte sector that contains the data needed due to a cache line miss. In some cases, setting this option to disabled can improve performance. Typically, setting this option to enabled provides better performance. Only disable this option after performing application benchmarking to verify improved performance in the environment.
Energy Efficient P-state (Default = Enabled):
This BIOS option allows to set whether the operating system selects the energy efficiency policy in the CPU.
- Enabled: The operating system can select the energy efficiency policy.
- Disabled: The operating system cannot select the energy efficiency policy.
Energy Efficient Turbo (Default = Enabled):
This feature will opportunistically lower the turbo frequency to increase energy efficiency. This option set to disabled in overclocking situations where turbo frequency must remain constant.
Last updated November 5, 2019.
For questions about the meanings of these flags, please contact the tester.
For other inquiries, please contact info@spec.org
Copyright 2017-2019 Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation
Tested with SPEC CPU2017 v1.1.0.
Report generated on 2019-11-26 12:49:54 by SPEC CPU2017 flags formatter v5178.
![[benchmark]](https://www.spec.org/auto/cpu2017/images/benchmark.png)