Re: [PATCH v9 3/3] mm/madvise: introduce process_madvise() syscall: an external memory hinting API

From: Eric Dumazet
Date: Mon Nov 16 2020 - 04:03:11 EST




On 9/21/20 7:55 PM, Minchan Kim wrote:
> On Mon, Sep 21, 2020 at 07:56:33AM +0100, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
>> On Mon, Aug 31, 2020 at 05:06:33PM -0700, Minchan Kim wrote:
>>> There is usecase that System Management Software(SMS) want to give a
>>> memory hint like MADV_[COLD|PAGEEOUT] to other processes and in the
>>> case of Android, it is the ActivityManagerService.
>>>
>>> The information required to make the reclaim decision is not known to
>>> the app. Instead, it is known to the centralized userspace
>>> daemon(ActivityManagerService), and that daemon must be able to
>>> initiate reclaim on its own without any app involvement.
>>>
>>> To solve the issue, this patch introduces a new syscall process_madvise(2).
>>> It uses pidfd of an external process to give the hint. It also supports
>>> vector address range because Android app has thousands of vmas due to
>>> zygote so it's totally waste of CPU and power if we should call the
>>> syscall one by one for each vma.(With testing 2000-vma syscall vs
>>> 1-vector syscall, it showed 15% performance improvement. I think it
>>> would be bigger in real practice because the testing ran very cache
>>> friendly environment).
>>
>> I'm really not sure this syscall is a good idea. If you want central
>> control you should implement an IPC mechanisms that allows your
>> supervisor daemon to tell the application to perform the madvice
>> instead of forcing the behavior on it.
>
> There was dicussion about the approach. There were several issues.
> One of them was the target app was already freezed and we wanted
> to run the syscall in caller's context, not callee.
>
>>
>>> /*
>>> * The madvise(2) system call.
>>> *
>>> @@ -1036,6 +1049,11 @@ madvise_behavior_valid(int behavior)
>>> * MADV_DONTDUMP - the application wants to prevent pages in the given range
>>> * from being included in its core dump.
>>> * MADV_DODUMP - cancel MADV_DONTDUMP: no longer exclude from core dump.
>>> + * MADV_COLD - the application is not expected to use this memory soon,
>>> + * deactivate pages in this range so that they can be reclaimed
>>> + * easily if memory pressure hanppens.
>>> + * MADV_PAGEOUT - the application is not expected to use this memory soon,
>>> + * page out the pages in this range immediately.
>>
>> This should really go into a separate patch, as it has nothing to do
>> with the new syscall.
>
> Technically, right but I expected it's not worth to have separate patch.
>
>>
>>> +static int process_madvise_vec(struct mm_struct *mm, struct iov_iter *iter, int behavior)
>>> +{
>>> + struct iovec iovec;
>>> + int ret = 0;
>>> +
>>> + while (iov_iter_count(iter)) {
>>> + iovec = iov_iter_iovec(iter);
>>> + ret = do_madvise(mm, (unsigned long)iovec.iov_base, iovec.iov_len, behavior);
>>> + if (ret < 0)
>>> + break;
>>> + iov_iter_advance(iter, iovec.iov_len);
>>> + }
>>> +
>>> + return ret;
>>
>> Please avoid the entirely pointless overly long line.
>>
>>> +static inline int madv_import_iovec(int type, const struct iovec __user *uvec, unsigned int nr_segs,
>>> + unsigned int fast_segs, struct iovec **iov, struct iov_iter *i)
>>> +{
>>> +#ifdef CONFIG_COMPAT
>>> + if (in_compat_syscall())
>>> + return compat_import_iovec(type, (struct compat_iovec __user *)uvec, nr_segs,
>>> + fast_segs, iov, i);
>>> +#endif
>>
>> More of the same.
>>
>>> +SYSCALL_DEFINE5(process_madvise, int, pidfd, const struct iovec __user *, vec,
>>> + unsigned long, vlen, int, behavior, unsigned int, flags)
>>> +{
>>> + ssize_t ret;
>>> + struct iovec iovstack[UIO_FASTIOV];
>>> + struct iovec *iov = iovstack;
>>> + struct iov_iter iter;
>>> +
>>> + ret = madv_import_iovec(READ, vec, vlen, ARRAY_SIZE(iovstack), &iov, &iter);
>>> + if (ret < 0)
>>> + return ret;
>>> +
>>> + ret = do_process_madvise(pidfd, &iter, behavior, flags);
>>> + kfree(iov);
>>> + return ret;
>>
>> Even more here. But more importantly there seems to be absolutely
>> no reason for the madv_import_iovec and do_process_madvise helpers
>> that both are tiny and have this even smaller function as the only
>> caller.
>
> Fair enough.
>
>
> Andrew, could you fold this patch?
> Thank you.
>
> From 02d63c6b3f61a1085f4eab80f5171bd2627b5ab0 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
> From: Minchan Kim <minchan@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Date: Mon, 21 Sep 2020 09:31:25 -0700
> Subject: [PATCH] mm: do not use helper functions for process_madvise
>
> This patch removes helper functions process_madvise_vec,
> do_process_madvise and madv_import_iovec and use them inline.
>
> Signed-off-by: Minchan Kim <minchan@xxxxxxxxxx>
> ---
> mm/madvise.c | 97 +++++++++++++++++++++++-----------------------------
> 1 file changed, 43 insertions(+), 54 deletions(-)
>
> diff --git a/mm/madvise.c b/mm/madvise.c
> index ae266dfede8a..aa8bc65dbdb6 100644
> --- a/mm/madvise.c
> +++ b/mm/madvise.c
> @@ -1166,37 +1166,40 @@ SYSCALL_DEFINE3(madvise, unsigned long, start, size_t, len_in, int, behavior)
> return do_madvise(current->mm, start, len_in, behavior);
> }
>
> -static int process_madvise_vec(struct mm_struct *mm, struct iov_iter *iter, int behavior)
> -{
> - struct iovec iovec;
> - int ret = 0;
> -
> - while (iov_iter_count(iter)) {
> - iovec = iov_iter_iovec(iter);
> - ret = do_madvise(mm, (unsigned long)iovec.iov_base, iovec.iov_len, behavior);
> - if (ret < 0)
> - break;
> - iov_iter_advance(iter, iovec.iov_len);
> - }
> -
> - return ret;
> -}
> -
> -static ssize_t do_process_madvise(int pidfd, struct iov_iter *iter,
> - int behavior, unsigned int flags)
> +SYSCALL_DEFINE5(process_madvise, int, pidfd, const struct iovec __user *, vec,
> + size_t, vlen, int, behavior, unsigned int, flags)
> {
> ssize_t ret;
> + struct iovec iovstack[UIO_FASTIOV], iovec;
> + struct iovec *iov = iovstack;
> + struct iov_iter iter;
> struct pid *pid;
> struct task_struct *task;
> struct mm_struct *mm;
> - size_t total_len = iov_iter_count(iter);
> + size_t total_len;
>
> - if (flags != 0)
> - return -EINVAL;
> + if (flags != 0) {
> + ret = -EINVAL;
> + goto out;
> + }
> +
> +#ifdef CONFIG_COMPAT
> + if (in_compat_syscall())
> + ret = compat_import_iovec(READ,
> + (struct compat_iovec __user *)vec, vlen,
> + ARRAY_SIZE(iovstack), &iov, &iter);
> + else
> +#endif
> + ret = import_iovec(READ, vec, vlen, ARRAY_SIZE(iovstack),
> + &iov, &iter);
> + if (ret < 0)
> + goto out;
>
> pid = pidfd_get_pid(pidfd);
> - if (IS_ERR(pid))
> - return PTR_ERR(pid);
> + if (IS_ERR(pid)) {
> + ret = PTR_ERR(pid);
> + goto free_iov;
> + }
>
> task = get_pid_task(pid, PIDTYPE_PID);
> if (!task) {
> @@ -1216,43 +1219,29 @@ static ssize_t do_process_madvise(int pidfd, struct iov_iter *iter,
> goto release_task;
> }
>
> - ret = process_madvise_vec(mm, iter, behavior);
> - if (ret >= 0)
> - ret = total_len - iov_iter_count(iter);
> + total_len = iov_iter_count(&iter);
> +
> + while (iov_iter_count(&iter)) {
> + iovec = iov_iter_iovec(&iter);
> + ret = do_madvise(mm, (unsigned long)iovec.iov_base,
> + iovec.iov_len, behavior);
> + if (ret < 0)
> + break;
> + iov_iter_advance(&iter, iovec.iov_len);
> + }
> +
> + if (ret == 0)
> + ret = total_len - iov_iter_count(&iter);
>
> mmput(mm);
> + return ret;

This "return ret;" seems quite wrong...

I will send the following :

diff --git a/mm/madvise.c b/mm/madvise.c
index 416a56b8e757bf3465ab13cea51e0751ade2c745..cc9224a59e9fa07e41f9b4ad2e58b9c97889299b 100644
--- a/mm/madvise.c
+++ b/mm/madvise.c
@@ -1231,7 +1231,6 @@ SYSCALL_DEFINE5(process_madvise, int, pidfd, const struct iovec __user *, vec,
ret = total_len - iov_iter_count(&iter);

mmput(mm);
- return ret;

release_task:
put_task_struct(task);




> +
> release_task:
> put_task_struct(task);
> put_pid:
> put_pid(pid);
> - return ret;
> -}
> -
> -static inline int madv_import_iovec(int type, const struct iovec __user *uvec, size_t nr_segs,
> - unsigned int fast_segs, struct iovec **iov, struct iov_iter *i)
> -{
> -#ifdef CONFIG_COMPAT
> - if (in_compat_syscall())
> - return compat_import_iovec(type, (struct compat_iovec __user *)uvec, nr_segs,
> - fast_segs, iov, i);
> -#endif
> -
> - return import_iovec(type, uvec, nr_segs, fast_segs, iov, i);
> -}
> -
> -SYSCALL_DEFINE5(process_madvise, int, pidfd, const struct iovec __user *, vec,
> - size_t, vlen, int, behavior, unsigned int, flags)
> -{
> - ssize_t ret;
> - struct iovec iovstack[UIO_FASTIOV];
> - struct iovec *iov = iovstack;
> - struct iov_iter iter;
> -
> - ret = madv_import_iovec(READ, vec, vlen, ARRAY_SIZE(iovstack), &iov, &iter);
> - if (ret < 0)
> - return ret;
> -
> - ret = do_process_madvise(pidfd, &iter, behavior, flags);
> +free_iov:
> kfree(iov);
> +out:
> return ret;
> }
>