Re: [PATCH v1 00/11] virtio-mem: paravirtualized memory

[David Hildenbrand]

On 02.03.20 14:49, David Hildenbrand wrote:
> This series is based on latest linux-next. The patches are located at:
>     https://github.com/davidhildenbrand/linux.git virtio-mem-v1
> 
> The basic idea of virtio-mem is to provide a flexible,
> cross-architecture memory hot(un)plug solution that avoids many limitations
> imposed by existing technologies, architectures, and interfaces. More
> details can be found below and in linked material.
> 
> It's currently only enabled for x86-64, however, should theoretically work
> on any architecture that supports virtio and implements memory hot(un)plug
> under Linux - like s390x, powerpc64, and arm64. On x86-64, it is currently
> possible to add/remove memory to the system in >= 4MB granularity.
> Memory hotplug works very reliably. For memory unplug, there are no
> guarantees how much memory can actually get unplugged, it depends on the
> setup (especially: fragmentation of physical memory).
> 
> I am currently getting the QEMU side into shape (which will be posted as
> RFC soon, see below for a link to the current state). Experimental Kata
> support is in the works [4]. Also, a cloud-hypervisor implementation is
> under discussion [5].
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 1. virtio-mem
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> The basic idea behind virtio-mem was presented at KVM Forum 2018. The
> slides can be found at [1]. The previous RFC can be found at [2]. The
> first RFC can be found at [3]. However, the concept evolved over time. The
> KVM Forum slides roughly match the current design.
> 
> Patch #2 ("virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotplug") contains quite some
> information, especially in "include/uapi/linux/virtio_mem.h":
> 
>     Each virtio-mem device manages a dedicated region in physical address
>     space. Each device can belong to a single NUMA node, multiple devices
>     for a single NUMA node are possible. A virtio-mem device is like a
>     "resizable DIMM" consisting of small memory blocks that can be plugged
>     or unplugged. The device driver is responsible for (un)plugging memory
>     blocks on demand.
> 
>     Virtio-mem devices can only operate on their assigned memory region in
>     order to (un)plug memory. A device cannot (un)plug memory belonging to
>     other devices.
> 
>     The "region_size" corresponds to the maximum amount of memory that can
>     be provided by a device. The "size" corresponds to the amount of memory
>     that is currently plugged. "requested_size" corresponds to a request
>     from the device to the device driver to (un)plug blocks. The
>     device driver should try to (un)plug blocks in order to reach the
>     "requested_size". It is impossible to plug more memory than requested.
> 
>     The "usable_region_size" represents the memory region that can actually
>     be used to (un)plug memory. It is always at least as big as the
>     "requested_size" and will grow dynamically. It will only shrink when
>     explicitly triggered (VIRTIO_MEM_REQ_UNPLUG).
> 
>     There are no guarantees what will happen if unplugged memory is
>     read/written. Such memory should, in general, not be touched. E.g.,
>     even writing might succeed, but the values will simply be discarded at
>     random points in time.
> 
>     It can happen that the device cannot process a request, because it is
>     busy. The device driver has to retry later.
> 
>     Usually, during system resets all memory will get unplugged, so the
>     device driver can start with a clean state. However, in specific
>     scenarios (if the device is busy) it can happen that the device still
>     has memory plugged. The device driver can request to unplug all memory
>     (VIRTIO_MEM_REQ_UNPLUG) - which might take a while to succeed if the
>     device is busy.
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 2. Linux Implementation
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Memory blocks (e.g., 128MB) are added/removed on demand. Within these
> memory blocks, subblocks (e.g., 4MB) are plugged/unplugged. The sizes
> depend on the target architecture, MAX_ORDER, pageblock_order, and
> the block size of a virtio-mem device.
> 
> add_memory()/try_remove_memory() is used to add/remove memory blocks.
> virtio-mem will not online memory blocks itself. This has to be done by
> user space, or configured into the kernel
> (CONFIG_MEMORY_HOTPLUG_DEFAULT_ONLINE). virtio-mem will only unplug memory
> that was online to the ZONE_NORMAL. Memory is suggested to be onlined to
> the ZONE_NORMAL for now.
> 
> The memory hotplug notifier is used to properly synchronize against
> onlining/offlining of memory blocks and to track the states of memory
> blocks (including the zone memory blocks are onlined to).
> 
> The set_online_page() callback is used to keep unplugged subblocks
> of a memory block fake-offline when onlining the memory block.
> generic_online_page() is used to fake-online plugged subblocks. This
> handling is similar to the Hyper-V balloon driver.
> 
> PG_offline is used to mark unplugged subblocks as offline, so e.g.,
> dumping tools (makedumpfile) will skip these pages. This is similar to
> other balloon drivers like virtio-balloon and Hyper-V.
> 
> Memory offlining code is extended to allow drivers to drop their reference
> to PG_offline pages when MEM_GOING_OFFLINE, so these pages can be skipped
> when offlining memory blocks. This allows to offline memory blocks that
> have partially unplugged (allocated e.g., via alloc_contig_range())
> subblocks - or are completely unplugged.
> 
> alloc_contig_range()/free_contig_range() [now exposed] is used to
> unplug/plug subblocks of memory blocks the are already exposed to Linux.
> 
> offline_and_remove_memory() [new] is used to offline a fully unplugged
> memory block and remove it from Linux.
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 3. Changes RFC v4 -> v1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Only minor things changed, especially, nothing on the virtio side.
> - "virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotplug"
> -- Fix compilation without CONFIG_ACPI_NUMA
> -- Minor code simplifications
> -- Better lockdep handling
> -- Fix retry handling when getting a config update while processing work
> - "virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotunplug part 1"
> - "virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotunplug part 2"
> -- Unplug memory from highest to lowest, as we plug from lowest to highest
> - "mm: Allow to offline unmovable PageOffline() pages via
>    MEM_GOING_OFFLINE"
> -- Optimized comments/description
> - "mm/memory_hotplug: Introduce offline_and_remove_memory()"
> -- Rephrased description
> - Drop the drop_slab() functionality for now
> - Added "MAINTAINERS: Add myself as virtio-mem maintainer"
> - Fixed many spelling issues. checkpatch mostly complains about BUG_ONs
>   and two macros, which is fine.
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 4. Future work
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> virtio-mem extensions (via new feature flags):
> - Indicate the guest status (e.g., initialized, working, all memory is
>   busy when unplugging, too many memory blocks are offline when plugging,
>   etc.)
> - Guest-triggered shrinking of the usable region (e.g., whenever the
>   highest memory block is removed).
> - Exchange of plugged<->unplugged block for defragmentation.
> 
> Memory hotplug:
> - Reduce the amount of memory resources if that tunes out to be an
>   issue. Or try to speed up relevant code paths to deal with many
>   resources.
> - Allocate vmemmap from added memory.
> 
> Memory hotunplug:
> - Performance improvements:
> -- Sense (lockless) if it make sense to try alloc_contig_range() at all
>    before directly trying to isolate and taking locks.
> -- Try to unplug bigger chunks within a memory block first.
> - Make unplug more likely to succeed:
> -- There are various idea to limit fragmentation on memory block
>    granularity. (e.g., ZONE_PREFER_MOVABLE and smart balancing)
> -- Allocate vmemmap from added memory.
> - OOM handling, e.g., via an OOM handler.
> - Defragmentation
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 5. Example Usage
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> A QEMU implementation (without protection of unplugged memory, but with
> resizable memory regions and optimized migration) is available at (kept
> updated):
>     https://github.com/davidhildenbrand/qemu.git virtio-mem
> 
> Start QEMU with two virtio-mem devices (one per NUMA node):
>  $ qemu-system-x86_64 -m 4G,maxmem=204G \
>   -smp sockets=2,cores=2 \
>   -numa node,nodeid=0,cpus=0-1 -numa node,nodeid=1,cpus=2-3 \
>   [...]
>   -object memory-backend-ram,id=mem0,size=100G,managed-size=on \
>   -device virtio-mem-pci,id=vm0,memdev=mem0,node=0,requested-size=0M \
>   -object memory-backend-ram,id=mem1,size=100G,managed-size=on \
>   -device virtio-mem-pci,id=vm1,memdev=mem1,node=1,requested-size=1G
> 
> Query the configuration:
>  QEMU 4.2.50 monitor - type 'help' for more information
>  (qemu) info memory-devices
>  Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm0"
>    memaddr: 0x140000000
>    node: 0
>    requested-size: 0
>    size: 0
>    max-size: 107374182400
>    block-size: 2097152
>    memdev: /objects/mem0
>  Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm1"
>    memaddr: 0x1a40000000
>    node: 1
>    requested-size: 1073741824
>    size: 1073741824
>    max-size: 107374182400
>    block-size: 2097152
>    memdev: /objects/mem1
> 
> Add some memory to node 0:
>  QEMU 4.2.50 monitor - type 'help' for more information
>  (qemu) qom-set vm0 requested-size 1G
> 
> Remove some memory from node 1:
>  QEMU 4.2.50 monitor - type 'help' for more information
>  (qemu) qom-set vm1 requested-size 64M
> 
> Query the configuration again:
>  QEMU 4.2.50 monitor - type 'help' for more information
>  (qemu) info memory-devices
>  Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm0"
>    memaddr: 0x140000000
>    node: 0
>    requested-size: 1073741824
>    size: 1073741824
>    max-size: 107374182400
>    block-size: 2097152
>    memdev: /objects/mem0
>  Memory device [virtio-mem]: "vm1"
>    memaddr: 0x1a40000000
>    node: 1
>    requested-size: 67108864
>    size: 67108864
>    max-size: 107374182400
>    block-size: 2097152
>    memdev: /objects/mem1
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 6. Q/A
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Q: Why add/remove parts ("subblocks") of memory blocks/sections?
> A: Flexibility (section size depends on the architecture) - e.g., some
>    architectures have a section size of 2GB. Also, the memory block size
>    is variable (e.g., on x86-64). I want to avoid any such restrictions.
>    Some use cases want to add/remove memory in smaller granularity to a
>    VM (e.g., the Hyper-V balloon also implements this) - especially smaller
>    VMs like used for kata containers. Also, on memory unplug, it is more
>    reliable to free-up and unplug multiple small chunks instead
>    of one big chunk. E.g., if one page of a DIMM is either unmovable or
>    pinned, the DIMM can't get unplugged. This approach is basically a
>    compromise between DIMM-based memory hot(un)plug and balloon
>    inflation/deflation, which works mostly on page granularity.
> 
> Q: Why care about memory blocks?
> A: They are the way to tell user space about new memory. This way,
>    memory can get onlined/offlined by user space. Also, e.g., kdump
>    relies on udev events to reload kexec when memory blocks are
>    onlined/offlined. Memory blocks are the "real" memory hot(un)plug
>    granularity. Everything that's smaller has to be emulated "on top".
> 
> Q: Won't memory unplug of subblocks fragment memory?
> A: Yes and no. Unplugging e.g., >=4MB subblocks on x86-64 will not really
>    fragment memory like unplugging random pages like a balloon driver does.
>    Buddy merging will not be limited. However, any allocation that requires
>    bigger consecutive memory chunks (e.g., gigantic pages) might observe
>    the fragmentation. Possible solutions: Allocate gigantic huge pages
>    before unplugging memory, don't unplug memory, combine virtio-mem with
>    DIMM based memory or bigger initial memory. Remember, a virtio-mem
>    device will only unplug on the memory range it manages, not on other
>    DIMMs. Unplug of single memory blocks will result in similar
>    fragmentation in respect to gigantic huge pages.
> 
> Q: How reliable is memory unplug?
> A: There are no guarantees on how much memory can get unplugged
>    again. However, it is more likely to find 4MB chunks to unplug than
>    e.g., 128MB chunks. If memory is terribly fragmented, there is nothing
>    we can do - for now. I consider memory hotplug the first primary use
>    of virtio-mem. Memory unplug might usually work, but we want to improve
>    the performance and the amount of memory we can actually unplug later.
> 
> Q: Why not unplug from the ZONE_MOVABLE?
> A: Unplugged memory chunks are unmovable. Unmovable data must not end up
>    on the ZONE_MOVABLE - similar to gigantic pages - they will never be
>    allocated from ZONE_MOVABLE. virtio-mem added memory can be onlined
>    to the ZONE_MOVABLE, but subblocks will not get unplugged from it.
> 
> Q: How big should the initial (!virtio-mem) memory of a VM be?
> A: virtio-mem memory will not go to the DMA zones. So to avoid running out
>    of DMA memory, I suggest something like 2-3GB on x86-64. But many
>    VMs can most probably deal with less DMA memory - depends on the use
>    case.
> 
> [1] https://events.linuxfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/virtio-mem-Paravirtualized-Memory-David-Hildenbrand-Red-Hat-1.pdf
> [2] https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20190919142228.5483-1-david@xxxxxxxxxx
> [3] https://lkml.kernel.org/r/547865a9-d6c2-7140-47e2-5af01e7d761d@xxxxxxxxxx
> [4] https://github.com/kata-containers/documentation/pull/592
> [5] https://github.com/cloud-hypervisor/cloud-hypervisor/pull/837
> 
> Cc: Sebastien Boeuf <sebastien.boeuf@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Samuel Ortiz <samuel.ortiz@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Robert Bradford <robert.bradford@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Luiz Capitulino <lcapitulino@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Pankaj Gupta <pankaj.gupta.linux@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: teawater <teawaterz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Igor Mammedov <imammedo@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Dr. David Alan Gilbert <dgilbert@xxxxxxxxxx>
> 
> David Hildenbrand (11):
>   ACPI: NUMA: export pxm_to_node
>   virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotplug
>   virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotunplug part 1
>   mm: Export alloc_contig_range() / free_contig_range()
>   virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotunplug part 2
>   mm: Allow to offline unmovable PageOffline() pages via
>     MEM_GOING_OFFLINE
>   virtio-mem: Allow to offline partially unplugged memory blocks
>   mm/memory_hotplug: Introduce offline_and_remove_memory()
>   virtio-mem: Offline and remove completely unplugged memory blocks
>   virtio-mem: Better retry handling
>   MAINTAINERS: Add myself as virtio-mem maintainer

As requested by Michal, I will squash some patches.

I'll pull out the NID thingies from "virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory
hotplug" and squash "ACPI: NUMA: export pxm_to_node" into that change.

Also, I'll squash "mm: Export alloc_contig_range() /
free_contig_range()" into "virtio-mem: Paravirtualized memory hotunplug
part 2". I'll not squash the other, more involved, MM patches.

Thanks!

-- 
Thanks,

David / dhildenb