Re: [PATCH net-next v3 0/5] page_pool: recycle buffers

[Yunsheng Lin]

On 2021/5/6 20:58, Ilias Apalodimas wrote:
>>>>
>>>
>>> Not really, the opposite is happening here. If the pp_recycle bit is set we
>>> will always call page_pool_return_skb_page().  If the page signature matches
>>> the 'magic' set by page pool we will always call xdp_return_skb_frame() will
>>> end up calling __page_pool_put_page(). If the refcnt is 1 we'll try
>>> to recycle the page.  If it's not we'll release it from page_pool (releasing
>>> some internal references we keep) unmap the buffer and decrement the refcnt.
>>
>> Yes, I understood the above is what the page pool do now.
>>
>> But the question is who is still holding an extral reference to the page when
>> kfree_skb()? Perhaps a cloned and pskb_expand_head()'ed skb is holding an extral
>> reference to the same page? So why not just do a page_ref_dec() if the orginal skb
>> is freed first, and call __page_pool_put_page() when the cloned skb is freed later?
>> So that we can always reuse the recyclable page from a recyclable skb. This may
>> make the page_pool_destroy() process delays longer than before, I am supposed the
>> page_pool_destroy() delaying for cloned skb case does not really matters here.
>>
>> If the above works, I think the samiliar handling can be added to RX zerocopy if
>> the RX zerocopy also hold extral references to the recyclable page from a recyclable
>> skb too?
>>
> 
> Right, this sounds doable, but I'll have to go back code it and see if it
> really makes sense.  However I'd still prefer the support to go in as-is
> (including the struct xdp_mem_info in struct page, instead of a page_pool
> pointer).
> 
> There's a couple of reasons for that.  If we keep the struct xdp_mem_info we
> can in the future recycle different kind of buffers using __xdp_return().
> And this is a non intrusive change if we choose to store the page pool address
> directly in the future.  It just affects the internal contract between the
> page_pool code and struct page.  So it won't affect any drivers that already
> use the feature.

This patchset has embeded a signature field in "struct page", and xdp_mem_info
is stored in page_private(), which seems not considering the case for associating
the page pool with "struct page" directly yet? Is the page pool also stored in
page_private() and a different signature is used to indicate that?

I am not saying we have to do it in this patchset, but we have to consider it
while we are adding new signature field to "struct page", right?

> Regarding the page_ref_dec(), which as I said sounds doable, I'd prefer
> playing it safe for now and getting rid of the buffers that somehow ended up
> holding an extra reference.  Once this gets approved we can go back and try to
> save the extra space.  I hope I am not wrong but the changes required to
> support a few extra refcounts should not change the current patches much.
> 
> Thanks for taking the time on this!

Thanks all invovled in the effort improving page pool too:)

> /Ilias
> 
>>>
>>> [1] https://lore.kernel.org/netdev/154413868810.21735.572808840657728172.stgit@firesoul/
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>> /Ilias
>>>
>>> .
>>>
>>
> 
> .
>