Re: [PATCH 0/3] mmu_notifier: Allow to manage CPU external TLBs

[Sander, Ben]

Yes. AMD has tested this with the iommuv2 driver and verified it works correctly.  There is a corresponding change in the iommuv2 driver to use the new API. 

> On Jul 24, 2014, at 6:33 PM, "Andrew Morton" <akpm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
>> On Thu, 24 Jul 2014 16:35:38 +0200 Joerg Roedel <joro@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> 
>> here is a patch-set to extend the mmu_notifiers in the Linux
>> kernel to allow managing CPU external TLBs. Those TLBs may
>> be implemented in IOMMUs or any other external device, e.g.
>> ATS/PRI capable PCI devices.
>> 
>> The problem with managing these TLBs are the semantics of
>> the invalidate_range_start/end call-backs currently
>> available. Currently the subsystem using mmu_notifiers has
>> to guarantee that no new TLB entries are established between
>> invalidate_range_start/end. Furthermore the
>> invalidate_range_start() function is called when all pages
>> are still mapped and invalidate_range_end() when the pages
>> are unmapped an already freed.
>> 
>> So both call-backs can't be used to safely flush any non-CPU
>> TLB because _start() is called too early and _end() too
>> late.
>> 
>> In the AMD IOMMUv2 driver this is currently implemented by
>> assigning an empty page-table to the external device between
>> _start() and _end(). But as tests have shown this doesn't
>> work as external devices don't re-fault infinitly but enter
>> a failure state after some time.
>> 
>> Next problem with this solution is that it causes an
>> interrupt storm for IO page faults to be handled when an
>> empty page-table is assigned.
>> 
>> To solve this situation I wrote a patch-set to introduce a
>> new notifier call-back: mmu_notifer_invalidate_range(). This
>> notifier lifts the strict requirements that no new
>> references are taken in the range between _start() and
>> _end(). When the subsystem can't guarantee that any new
>> references are taken is has to provide the
>> invalidate_range() call-back to clear any new references in
>> there.
>> 
>> It is called between invalidate_range_start() and _end()
>> every time the VMM has to wipe out any references to a
>> couple of pages. This are usually the places where the CPU
>> TLBs are flushed too and where its important that this
>> happens before invalidate_range_end() is called.
>> 
>> Any comments and review appreciated!
> 
> It looks pretty simple and harmless.
> 
> I assume the AMD IOMMUv2 driver actually uses this and it's all
> tested and good?  What is the status of that driver?
> 
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/