From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from mta1.migadu.com (out-79.mta1.migadu.com [95.215.58.79]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256 (128/128 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by smtp.subspace.kernel.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id E75672E413 for ; Sat, 15 Aug 2026 14:28:30 +0000 (UTC) Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; arc=none smtp.client-ip=95.215.58.79 ARC-Seal:i=1; a=rsa-sha256; d=subspace.kernel.org; s=arc-20240116; t=1786804114; cv=none; b=oU5b/6xm8cdnPXPennrT/G/LJqoUJc/ITA3GDGQYjelsUHSWvoFPY5gdxwhTODT0Xy5KPlXM7hX5lJsNOtmRg+1/3CeAjkqxmF4b3XZJNOgP2DHfzLgVdGeK9r+Ck/QTBHKONVnoWDQ/99c9Vwh1Qm+D8V7Z0L0pj1bIFKdgCto= ARC-Message-Signature:i=1; a=rsa-sha256; d=subspace.kernel.org; s=arc-20240116; t=1786804114; c=relaxed/simple; bh=wptz7pbfxXelwLjsyLrsb4gBa8CCKoEKwLIMEkMPWy0=; h=Mime-Version:Content-Type:Date:Message-Id:Cc:Subject:From:To: References:In-Reply-To; b=jyKIvPSz9HgqNpNffi4fh+tqVnIm3CKE5RGhBHaVy+iAjpNdXJ8WN1PXACOwF1noWVAftvOvs1o+iQkx73XKSrDAjzgT+SbNldghgIq8XgrRGcXf07WPwiBAVBCwhKPxyb0VHG3kC81buae8rUlW9oc3oF7yWWHcqQKUJ5IlmJQ= ARC-Authentication-Results:i=1; smtp.subspace.kernel.org; dmarc=pass (p=none dis=none) header.from=linux.dev; spf=pass smtp.mailfrom=linux.dev; dkim=pass (1024-bit key) header.d=linux.dev header.i=@linux.dev header.b=LccT5TKV; arc=none smtp.client-ip=95.215.58.79 Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; dmarc=pass (p=none dis=none) header.from=linux.dev Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; spf=pass smtp.mailfrom=linux.dev Authentication-Results: smtp.subspace.kernel.org; dkim=pass (1024-bit key) header.d=linux.dev header.i=@linux.dev header.b="LccT5TKV" X-Envelope-To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org DKIM-Signature: a=rsa-sha256; bh=wptz7pbfxXelwLjsyLrsb4gBa8CCKoEKwLIMEkMPWy0=; c=simple/simple; d=linux.dev; h=from:to:subject:date:message-id:mime-version:content-type; s=key1; t=1786804108; v=1; x=1787408908; b=LccT5TKVwsNxxKmWEGiTbR09kZsQWRA3+1J11ChNDZ89xF/+ggSL/zzGqQ0ThfFnG7/FwDVg F2oEX20Zw3K+XXrtkl970Txh0X07PzR7Wtv0+zS7O9y54SwQfafH11LaZt4kt0BLlyFr3CEquz2 sSJWqgzReBKcIYdHAyzKefvc= X-Envelope-To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Received: from localhost (77.97.51.77) by smtp.migadu.com with ESMTPS id 3f35d2d73d1366e7; Sat, 15 Aug 2026 14:28:28 +0000 X-Migadu-Flow: FLOW_OUT Precedence: bulk X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org List-Id: List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Date: Sat, 15 Aug 2026 15:28:26 +0100 Message-Id: Cc: "Borislav Petkov" , "Dave Hansen" , "Peter Zijlstra" , "Andrew Morton" , "David Hildenbrand" , "Vlastimil Babka" , "Mike Rapoport" , "Wei Xu" , "Johannes Weiner" , "Zi Yan" , "Lorenzo Stoakes" , , , , "Sumit Garg" , "Will Deacon" , , , "Itazuri, Takahiro" , "Andy Lutomirski" , "David Kaplan" , "Thomas Gleixner" , "Patrick Bellasi" , "Reiji Watanabe" , "Sean Christopherson" Subject: Re: [PATCH v3 21/26] mm/page_alloc: implement FREETYPE_UNMAPPED allocations From: "Brendan Jackman" To: "Yosry Ahmed" X-Mailer: aerc 0.21.0 References: <20260726-page_alloc-unmapped-v3-0-6f5729aa9832@google.com> <20260726-page_alloc-unmapped-v3-21-6f5729aa9832@google.com> In-Reply-To: On Wed Aug 5, 2026 at 12:53 AM BST, Yosry Ahmed wrote: >> @@ -3400,6 +3426,127 @@ static inline void zone_statistics(struct zone *= preferred_zone, struct zone *z, >> #endif >> } >> =20 >> +#ifdef CONFIG_PAGE_ALLOC_UNMAPPED >> +/* Try to allocate a page by mapping/unmapping a block from the direct = map. */ >> +static inline struct page * >> +__rmqueue_direct_map(struct zone *zone, unsigned int request_order, >> + unsigned int alloc_flags, freetype_t freetype) >> +{ >> + unsigned int ft_flags_other =3D freetype_flags(freetype) ^ FREETYPE_UN= MAPPED; >> + freetype_t ft_other =3D migrate_to_freetype(free_to_migratetype(freety= pe), >> + ft_flags_other); >> + bool want_mapped =3D !(freetype_flags(freetype) & FREETYPE_UNMAPPED); >> + enum rmqueue_mode rmqm =3D RMQUEUE_NORMAL; >> + unsigned long irq_flags; >> + int nr_pageblocks, nr_freed; >> + struct page *page; >> + int alloc_order; >> + int err; >> + >> + if (freetype_idx(ft_other) < 0) >> + return NULL; >> + >> + /* >> + * Might need a TLB shootdown. Even if IRQs are on this isn't >> + * safe if the caller holds a lock (in case the other CPUs need that >> + * lock to handle the shootdown IPI). >> + */ >> + if (alloc_flags & ALLOC_NOBLOCK) >> + return NULL; >> + >> + if (!can_set_direct_map() || alloc_flags & ALLOC_NOLOCK) >> + return NULL; >> + >> + lockdep_assert(!irqs_disabled() || unlikely(early_boot_irqs_disabled))= ; >> + >> + /* >> + * Need to [un]map a whole pageblock (otherwise it might require >> + * allocating pagetables). First allocate it. >> + */ >> + alloc_order =3D max(request_order, pageblock_order); >> + nr_pageblocks =3D 1 << (alloc_order - pageblock_order); >> + spin_lock_irqsave(&zone->lock, irq_flags); >> + /* First try a block that already has the right migratetype. */ >> + page =3D __rmqueue(zone, alloc_order, ft_other, alloc_flags, &rmqm); >> + if (!page) { >> + /* Fallback to changing a block's migratetype. */ >> + rmqm =3D RMQUEUE_CLAIM; >> + page =3D __rmqueue(zone, alloc_order, ft_other, alloc_flags, &rmqm); >> + } >> + spin_unlock_irqrestore(&zone->lock, irq_flags); >> + if (!page) >> + return NULL; > > IIUC we only try to change an entire pageblock here, but what if we > can't? If memory is fragmented enough that many pageblocks have few > unmapped pages in them, how do we serve a mapped allocation (e.g. a slab > allocation)? > > We'll go into reclaim/compaction, but there's a chance we'll end up with > unexpected allocation failures or OOM kills even though we have free > memory, because unmapped memory is not movable or reclaimable (as of > now, at least). > > The same could happen if many pageblocks have few mapped but unmovable > pages in them, and we make an unmapped allocation. Yeah, although just to be clear: those unmovable/unreclaimable pages are _already_ un{mov,reclaim}able, ALLOC_UNMAPPED doesn't change that. So in the situation where they prevent compaction, we were already somewhat in trouble re memory pressure. It's just that, with ALLOC_UNMAPPED, the allocation failures can start hitting us for lower-order allocations whereas before they only mattered for higher-order ones. How much worse is that? I'm not sure - my understanding from working with GCE people was that if fragmentation prevents allocating hugetlb pages for guest memory, yes in theory the system can fall back to base pages, but in practice the perf hit from doing that is intolerable, i.e. successful higher-order allocations are basically a hard requirement in the real world already. Is that unique to GCE or are other workloads like that too? I don't really know :/ The OTHER thing, trying to see this as zoomed-out as possible, is that the "unmapped pages are un{mov,reclaim}able" thing is hopefully very temporary? I'm pretty sure we want at least compaction for guest_memfd [0]. If we extend ALLOC_UNMAPPED into any other areas I also expect that to be the same. Secretmem is... well, whatever. So I think the "real" fix is to support compaction. [0]: https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260805-shivank-gmem-migrate-v3-9-00d8bde= c4e1d@amd.com/ > I wonder if we still need a fallback case where a pageblock contains a > mix of mapped and unmapped pages. We need to carefully handle such > pageblocks: > - For unmapped allocations, we need to unmap the relevant PTEs and > potentially do a TLB shootdown (if they were previously mapped). Maybe > we should always flush the TLB for simplicity for now. > - For mapped allocations, we need to map the relevant PTEs. No TLB > shootdown should be needed. > > Assuming unmapped allocations are always zeroed by the users on alloc > and free, we don't need to worry about zeroing pages either way. > > We may want to track the number of unmapped pages in such page blocks to > now when it's fully mapped or fully unmapped and change its type, but > maybe this can be a followup if needed. ... However, yes this might be unavoidable despite what I said above. This was also DavidH's feeling when I chatted to him a few months back. The hard parts of it are a) the tracking as you hinted at and b) in the general case that means allocating pagetables.=20 So yeah I think it's probably doable but I _really_ want to avoid doing it in this series if we possibly can.