Re: [PATCH v2] KVM: VMX: Enable Notify VM exit

[Xiaoyao Li]

On 9/3/2021 12:36 AM, Sean Christopherson wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 02, 2021, Sean Christopherson wrote:
> > On Tue, Aug 03, 2021, Xiaoyao Li wrote:
> > > On 8/2/2021 11:46 PM, Sean Christopherson wrote:
> > > > > > > @@ -5642,6 +5653,31 @@ static int handle_bus_lock_vmexit(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
> > > > > > >     	return 0;
> > > > > > >     }
> > > > > > > +static int handle_notify(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
> > > > > > > +{
> > > > > > > +	unsigned long exit_qual = vmx_get_exit_qual(vcpu);
> > > > > > > +
> > > > > > > +	if (!(exit_qual & NOTIFY_VM_CONTEXT_INVALID)) {
> > > > > >
> > > > > > What does CONTEXT_INVALID mean?  The ISE doesn't provide any information whatsoever.
> > > > >
> > > > > It means whether the VM context is corrupted and not valid in the VMCS.
> > > >
> > > > Well that's a bit terrifying.  Under what conditions can the VM context become
> > > > corrupted?  E.g. if the context can be corrupted by an inopportune NOTIFY exit,
> > > > then KVM needs to be ultra conservative as a false positive could be fatal to a
> > > > guest.
> > >
> > > Short answer is no case will set the VM_CONTEXT_INVALID bit.
> >
> > But something must set it, otherwise it wouldn't exist.  

For existing Intel silicon, no case will set it. Maybe in the future new 
case will set it.

> The condition(s) under
> > which it can be set matters because it affects how KVM should respond.  E.g. if
> > the guest can trigger VM_CONTEXT_INVALID at will, then we should probably treat
> > it as a shutdown and reset the VMCS.
>
> Oh, and "shutdown" would be relative to the VMCS, i.e. if L2 triggers a NOTIFY
> exit with VM_CONTEXT_INVALID then KVM shouldn't kill the entire VM.  The least
> awful option would probably be to synthesize a shutdown VM-Exit to L1.  That
> won't communicate to L1 that vmcs12 state is stale/bogus, but I don't see any way
> to handle that via an existing VM-Exit reason :-/
>
> > But if VM_CONTEXT_INVALID can occur if and only if there's a hardware/ucode
> > issue, then we can do:
> >
> > 	if (KVM_BUG_ON(exit_qual & NOTIFY_VM_CONTEXT_INVALID, vcpu->kvm))
> > 		return -EIO;
> >
> > Either way, to enable this by default we need some form of documentation that
> > describes what conditions lead to VM_CONTEXT_INVALID.

I still don't know why the conditions lead to it matters. I think the 
consensus is that once VM_CONTEXT_INVALID happens, the vcpu can no 
longer run. Either KVM_BUG_ON() or a specific EXIT to userspace should 
be OK?