[PATCH 3/6] mm/sparse-vmemmap: drop Device DAX-specific population path

From: Muchun Song

Date: Sun Sep 13 2026 - 04:41:02 EST


The common vmemmap path selects the shared page for optimized mappings
itself, so Device DAX no longer needs vmemmap_populate_compound_pages()
to find a shared tail page and pass its backing PFN through the generic
population helpers.

Remove the Device DAX-specific population path and let section memmap
population always use vmemmap_populate(). The powerpc retains an
architecture-specific compound-page implementation, so select it directly
from radix__vmemmap_populate() for optimizable sections.

Signed-off-by: Muchun Song <songmuchun@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
---
arch/powerpc/mm/book3s64/radix_pgtable.c | 3 +
mm/mm_init.c | 2 +-
mm/sparse-vmemmap.c | 71 +-----------------------
3 files changed, 5 insertions(+), 71 deletions(-)

diff --git a/arch/powerpc/mm/book3s64/radix_pgtable.c b/arch/powerpc/mm/book3s64/radix_pgtable.c
index 9ca28e4a610a..cb72d9ccf747 100644
--- a/arch/powerpc/mm/book3s64/radix_pgtable.c
+++ b/arch/powerpc/mm/book3s64/radix_pgtable.c
@@ -1122,7 +1122,10 @@ int __meminit radix__vmemmap_populate(unsigned long start, unsigned long end, in
pud_t *pud;
pmd_t *pmd;
pte_t *pte;
+ unsigned long pfn = page_to_pfn((struct page *)start);

+ if (section_vmemmap_optimizable(__pfn_to_section(pfn)))
+ return vmemmap_populate_compound_pages(pfn, start, end, node, NULL);
/*
* If altmap is present, Make sure we align the start vmemmap addr
* to PAGE_SIZE so that we calculate the correct start_pfn in
diff --git a/mm/mm_init.c b/mm/mm_init.c
index 56bb4567a494..1650d6bc1211 100644
--- a/mm/mm_init.c
+++ b/mm/mm_init.c
@@ -1046,7 +1046,7 @@ static void zone_device_page_init_from_template(struct page *page,
* initialize is a lot smaller that the total amount of struct pages being
* mapped. This is a paired / mild layering violation with explicit knowledge
* of how the sparse_vmemmap internals handle compound pages in the lack
- * of an altmap. See vmemmap_populate_compound_pages().
+ * of an altmap.
*/
static inline unsigned long compound_nr_pages(unsigned long pfn,
struct dev_pagemap *pgmap)
diff --git a/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c b/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c
index e83821768c12..028f844c90f5 100644
--- a/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c
+++ b/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c
@@ -454,71 +454,6 @@ int __meminit vmemmap_populate_hugepages(unsigned long start, unsigned long end,
return 0;
}

-#ifndef vmemmap_populate_compound_pages
-/*
- * For compound pages bigger than section size (e.g. x86 1G compound
- * pages with 2M subsection size) fill the rest of sections as tail
- * pages.
- *
- * Note that memremap_pages() resets @nr_range value and will increment
- * it after each range successful onlining. Thus the value or @nr_range
- * at section memmap populate corresponds to the in-progress range
- * being onlined here.
- */
-static bool __meminit reuse_compound_section(unsigned long start_pfn,
- struct dev_pagemap *pgmap)
-{
- unsigned long nr_pages = pgmap_vmemmap_nr(pgmap);
- unsigned long offset = start_pfn -
- PHYS_PFN(pgmap->ranges[pgmap->nr_range].start);
-
- return !IS_ALIGNED(offset, nr_pages) && nr_pages > PAGES_PER_SUBSECTION;
-}
-
-static int __meminit vmemmap_populate_compound_pages(unsigned long start_pfn,
- unsigned long start,
- unsigned long end, int node,
- struct dev_pagemap *pgmap)
-{
- unsigned long size, addr;
- pte_t *pte;
- int rc;
- struct page *page;
- unsigned int order = pfn_to_section_compound_order(start_pfn);
-
- page = vmemmap_shared_tail_page(order, device_zone(node));
- if (!page)
- return -ENOMEM;
-
- if (reuse_compound_section(start_pfn, pgmap))
- return vmemmap_populate_range(start, end, node, NULL,
- page_to_pfn(page));
-
- size = min(end - start, (1UL << order) * sizeof(struct page));
- for (addr = start; addr < end; addr += size) {
- unsigned long next, last = addr + size;
-
- /* Populate the head page vmemmap page */
- pte = vmemmap_populate_address(addr, node, NULL, -1);
- if (!pte)
- return -ENOMEM;
-
- /*
- * Reuse the shared page for the rest of tail pages
- * See layout diagram in Documentation/mm/vmemmap_dedup.rst
- */
- next = addr + PAGE_SIZE;
- rc = vmemmap_populate_range(next, last, node, NULL,
- page_to_pfn(page));
- if (rc)
- return -ENOMEM;
- }
-
- return 0;
-}
-
-#endif
-
struct page * __meminit __populate_section_memmap(unsigned long pfn,
unsigned long nr_pages, int nid, struct vmem_altmap *altmap,
struct dev_pagemap *pgmap)
@@ -531,11 +466,7 @@ struct page * __meminit __populate_section_memmap(unsigned long pfn,
!IS_ALIGNED(nr_pages, PAGES_PER_SUBSECTION)))
return NULL;

- if (pgmap && section_vmemmap_optimizable(__pfn_to_section(pfn)))
- r = vmemmap_populate_compound_pages(pfn, start, end, nid, pgmap);
- else
- r = vmemmap_populate(start, end, nid, altmap);
-
+ r = vmemmap_populate(start, end, nid, altmap);
if (r < 0)
return NULL;

--
2.54.0