Re: [PATCH v4 8/8] mm/mempolicy: read the zoneref slot once in mempolicy_slab_node()
From: Vlastimil Babka (SUSE)
Date: Thu Oct 29 2026 - 14:23:30 EST
On 10/28/26 22:19, Gregory Price (Meta) wrote:
> For a bind or preferred-many policy, mempolicy_slab_node() tests the
> first matching slot's zone for NULL, then reads the slot again to look
> up the zone's node. Offlining a zone's last block rebuilds the
> zonelists in place, so the second read can return the terminator:
>
> CPU 0 CPU 1
> mempolicy_slab_node()
> zonelist_zone(slot 4)
> = node 2 NORMAL
> offline_pages()
> build_all_zonelists()
> slot 4 = NULL
> zonelist_node_idx(slot 4)
> zone_to_nid(NULL)
>
> Current GCC merges the two reads, but nothing requires it. With
> mm/mempolicy.o built with -fno-inline -fno-ipa-sra, holding a bound
> task's slab_strict_numa allocation between the reads while a movable
> block earlier in the zonelist goes offline oopses every time:
>
> BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000060
> RIP: 0010:zone_to_nid+0x0/0x10
> Call Trace:
> kmem_cache_alloc_noprof+0x294/0x610
> do_getname+0x34/0x230
>
> mempolicy_slab_node() and zonelist_node_idx() are tail calls here, so
> neither appears in the trace.
>
> Read the slot once and use that zone.
>
> Fixes: 11cd8638c37f ("mm, page_alloc: remove stop_machine from build_all_zonelists")
> Cc: stable@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Signed-off-by: Gregory Price (Meta) <gourry@xxxxxxxxxx>
Reviewed-by: Vlastimil Babka (SUSE) <vbabka@xxxxxxxxxx>
> ---
> mm/mempolicy.c | 4 +++-
> 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>
> diff --git a/mm/mempolicy.c b/mm/mempolicy.c
> index 0884c629670d..cd63c3e2c029 100644
> --- a/mm/mempolicy.c
> +++ b/mm/mempolicy.c
> @@ -2176,6 +2176,7 @@ unsigned int mempolicy_slab_node(void)
> case MPOL_PREFERRED_MANY:
> {
> struct zoneref *z;
> + struct zone *zone;
>
> /*
> * Follow bind policy behavior and start allocation at the
> @@ -2186,7 +2187,8 @@ unsigned int mempolicy_slab_node(void)
> zonelist = &NODE_DATA(node)->node_zonelists[ZONELIST_FALLBACK];
> z = first_zones_zonelist(zonelist, highest_zoneidx,
> &policy->nodes);
> - return zonelist_zone(z) ? zonelist_node_idx(z) : node;
> + zone = zonelist_zone(z);
> + return zone ? zone_to_nid(zone) : node;
> }
> case MPOL_LOCAL:
> return node;