Re: [PATCH v3] mm/page_alloc: clear page->private in free_pages_prepare()

[David Hildenbrand (Arm)]

On 2/9/26 17:00, Zi Yan wrote:
> On 9 Feb 2026, at 10:46, David Hildenbrand (Arm) wrote:
>
> > On 2/9/26 12:17, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
> > > If the rule is now that when upon freeing in free_pages_prepare() we clear
> > > private in the head page and not tail pages (where we expect the owner of
> > > the page to do it), maybe that check for tail pages should be done in the
> > > is_check_pages_enabled() part of free_pages_prepare().
> > >
> > > Or should the check be also in the split path because somebody can set a
> > > tail private between allocation and split? (and not just inherit it from a
> > > previous allocation that didn't clear it?).
> >
> > We ran into that check in the past, when folio->X overlayed page->private in a tail, and would actually have to be zeroed out.
>
> Currently, _mm_id (_mm_ids) overlaps with page->private. At split time,
> it should be MM_ID_DUMMY (0), so page->private should be 0 all time.

Yes, it's designed like that; because that check here caught it during 
development :)

> > So it should be part of this splitting code I think.
>
> It is still better to have the check and fix in place. Why do we want to
> skip device private folio?

I don't understand the question, can you elaborate?

I asked Balbir why the check was dropped in the first place.

--
Cheers,

David