Re: [PATCHv3] mm: remove '!root_reclaim' checking in should_abort_scan()

[Barry Song]

On Wed, Mar 18, 2026 at 9:18 AM zhaoyang.huang
<zhaoyang.huang@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> From: Zhaoyang Huang <zhaoyang.huang@xxxxxxxxxx>
>
> Android systems usually use memory.reclaim interface to implement user
> space memory management which expects that the requested reclaim target
> and actually reclaimed amount memory are not diverging by too much. With
> the current MGRLU implementation there is, however, no bail out when the
> reclaim target is reached and this could lead to an excessive reclaim
> that scales with the reclaim hierarchy size.For example, we can get a
> nr_reclaimed=394/nr_to_reclaim=32 proactive reclaim under a common 1-N
> cgroup hierarchy.
> This defect arised from the goal of keeping fairness among memcgs that
> is, for try_to_free_mem_cgroup_pages -> shrink_node_memcgs ->
> shrink_lruvec -> lru_gen_shrink_lruvec -> try_to_shrink_lruvec, the
> !root_reclaim(sc) check was there for reclaim fairness, which was
> necessary before commit 'b82b530740b9' ("mm: vmscan: restore
> incremental cgroup iteration") because the fairness depended on
> attempted proportional reclaim from every memcg under the target
> memcg. However after commit 'b82b530740b9' there is no longer a need
> to visit every memcg to ensure fairness. Let's have try_to_shrink_lruvec
> bail out when the nr_reclaimed achieved.

I think we need some clarification here. Does the code

nr_to_scan = apply_proportional_protection(memcg, sc, nr_to_scan);

still serve a purpose, or has it become less useful after your patch?

>
> Suggested-by: T.J.Mercier <tjmercier@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Reviewed-by: T.J.Mercier <tjmercier@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Signed-off-by: Zhaoyang Huang <zhaoyang.huang@xxxxxxxxxx>
> ---
> Patchv2,v3: update commit message
> ---
> ---
>  mm/vmscan.c | 4 ----
>  1 file changed, 4 deletions(-)
>
> diff --git a/mm/vmscan.c b/mm/vmscan.c
> index 0fc9373e8251..10f1e7d716ca 100644
> --- a/mm/vmscan.c
> +++ b/mm/vmscan.c
> @@ -4839,10 +4839,6 @@ static bool should_abort_scan(struct lruvec *lruvec, struct scan_control *sc)
>         int i;
>         enum zone_watermarks mark;
>
> -       /* don't abort memcg reclaim to ensure fairness */
> -       if (!root_reclaim(sc))
> -               return false;
> -
>         if (sc->nr_reclaimed >= max(sc->nr_to_reclaim, compact_gap(sc->order)))
>                 return true;
>

Thanks
Barry