Re: [PATCH RESEND] userfaultfd: snapshot VMA state across UFFDIO_COPY retry

From: Mike Rapoport

Date: Wed May 20 2026 - 08:53:46 EST


On Wed, May 20, 2026 at 01:09:04PM +0200, David Hildenbrand (Arm) wrote:
> On 5/19/26 07:25, Mike Rapoport wrote:
> > From: "Mike Rapoport (Microsoft)" <rppt@xxxxxxxxxx>
> >
> > mfill_copy_folio_retry() drops the VMA lock for copy_from_user() and
> > reacquires it afterwards. The destination VMA can be replaced during that
> > window.
> >
> > The existing check compares vma_uffd_ops() before and after the retry, but
> > if a shmem VMA with MAP_SHARED is replaced with a shmem VMA with
> > MAP_PRIVATE (or vice versa) the replacement goes undetected.
> >
> > The change from MAP_PRIVATE to MAP_SHARED will treat the folio allocated
> > with shmem_alloc_folio() as anonymous and this will cause BUG() when
> > mfill_atomic_install_pte() will try to folio_add_new_anon_rmap().
> >
> > The change from MAP_SHARED to MAP_PRIVATE allows injection of folios into
> > the page cache of the original VMA.
> >
> > Introduce helpers for more comprehensive comparison of VMA state:
> > - vma_snapshot_get() to save the relevant VMA state into a struct
> > vma_snapshot (original uffd_ops, actual uffd_ops, relevant VMA flags,
> > vm_file and pgoff) before dropping the lock
> > - vma_snapshot_changed() to compare the saved state with the state of the
> > VMA acquired after retaking the locks
> > - vma_snapshot_put() to release vm_file pinning.
> >
> > Use DEFINE_FREE() cleanup to wrap vma_snapshot_put() to avoid complicating
> > error handling paths in mfill_copy_folio_retry().
> >
> > Add vma_uffd_copy_ops() to avoid code duplication when original ops of
> > shmem VMA with MAP_PRIVATE are replaced with anon_uffd_ops.
> >
> > Fixes: 292411fda25b ("mm/userfaultfd: detect VMA type change after copy retry in mfill_copy_folio_retry()")
> > Fixes: 6ab703034f14 ("userfaultfd: mfill_atomic(): remove retry logic")
> > Tested-by: Heechan Kang <gganji11@xxxxxxxxx>
> > Suggested-by: Peter Xu <peterx@xxxxxxxxxx>
> > Co-developed-by: David Carlier <devnexen@xxxxxxxxx>
> > Signed-off-by: David Carlier <devnexen@xxxxxxxxx>
> > Co-developed-by: Michael Bommarito <michael.bommarito@xxxxxxxxx>
> > Signed-off-by: Michael Bommarito <michael.bommarito@xxxxxxxxx>
> > Signed-off-by: Mike Rapoport (Microsoft) <rppt@xxxxxxxxxx>
> > ---
> > mm/userfaultfd.c | 99 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++----------
> > 1 file changed, 79 insertions(+), 20 deletions(-)
> >
> > diff --git a/mm/userfaultfd.c b/mm/userfaultfd.c
> > index 180bad42fc79..b70b84776a79 100644
> > --- a/mm/userfaultfd.c
> > +++ b/mm/userfaultfd.c
> > @@ -14,6 +14,8 @@
> > #include <linux/userfaultfd_k.h>
> > #include <linux/mmu_notifier.h>
> > #include <linux/hugetlb.h>
> > +#include <linux/file.h>
> > +#include <linux/cleanup.h>
> > #include <asm/tlbflush.h>
> > #include <asm/tlb.h>
> > #include "internal.h"
> > @@ -69,6 +71,24 @@ static const struct vm_uffd_ops *vma_uffd_ops(struct vm_area_struct *vma)
> > return vma->vm_ops ? vma->vm_ops->uffd_ops : NULL;
> > }
> >
> > +static const struct vm_uffd_ops *vma_uffd_copy_ops(struct vm_area_struct *vma)
> > +{
> > + const struct vm_uffd_ops *ops = vma_uffd_ops(vma);
> > +
> > + if (!ops)
> > + return NULL;
> > +
> > + /*
> > + * UFFDIO_COPY fills MAP_PRIVATE file-backed mappings as anonymous
> > + * memory. This is an effective ops override, so retry validation must
> > + * compare the override result, not just vma->vm_ops->uffd_ops.
> > + */
> > + if (!(vma->vm_flags & VM_SHARED))
> > + return &anon_uffd_ops;
> > +
> > + return ops;
> > +}
> > +
> > static __always_inline
> > bool validate_dst_vma(struct vm_area_struct *dst_vma, unsigned long dst_end)
> > {
> > @@ -443,14 +463,70 @@ static int mfill_copy_folio_locked(struct folio *folio, unsigned long src_addr)
> > return ret;
> > }
> >
> > +#define VMA_SNAPSHOT_FLAGS append_vma_flags(__VMA_UFFD_FLAGS, VMA_SHARED_BIT)
> > +
> > +struct vma_snapshot {
> > + const struct vm_uffd_ops *copy_ops;
> > + const struct vm_uffd_ops *ops;
> > + struct file *file;
> > + vma_flags_t flags;
> > + pgoff_t pgoff;
> > +};
>
> As this is all uffd specific, I wonder whether that should be "struct
> uffd_vma_snapshot"/"vma_uffd_snapshot" etc.

It's local to this file, I wouldn't worry about namespacing until there's
an actual need if it will ever arise.

> From a high level, this LGTM.
>
> I wish we could identify relevant VMA changes more easily. Like, using a per-MM
> sequence counter that we simply increment on any VMA changes.

Do you mean per-VMA?
Per-MM counter would capture unrelated changes, e.g. an masvise() for
unrelated range.

We kinda have an infrastructure to detect VMA changes that affect uffd
operation for non-cooperative, we can also hook on that even if
UFFD_EVENT_* are not requested, but that's way more involved that this VMA
snapshot.

> --
> Cheers,
>
> David

--
Sincerely yours,
Mike.