Re: Uclamp races due to non-atomic static_branch_likely updates

[Peter Zijlstra]

On Wed, Oct 21, 2026 at 09:21:36AM -0400, Steven Rostedt wrote:

> > And yeah, its always been the case that jump_labels (and static_branch)
> > updates are non-atomic. Most of them are init time, and don't care.
> > 
> > Now, I'm sure we've ran into this particular problem before, and it
> > always requires care.
> > 


Read this part:

> > Also note that a simple global boolean has the exact same problem.
> > Adding runtime conditionals isn't going to fix this.

again, and then consider your response..

> 
> Another idea for "atomic static branch" is to have two static branches at
> each location. One that switches to a "check this variable and do a normal
> test and branch" and "we are now in sync and can use the original static
> branch".
> 
> Something like:
> 
> 	if (static_branch_unlikely(&foo_use_variable.key)) {
> 		return static_key_enabled(&foo->key);
> 	} else {
> 		if (static_branch_unlikely(&foo->key))
> 			return true;
> 		else
> 			return false;
> 	}
> 
> And then in between updates of foo, the foo_use_variable gets set making
> all the branches use the key, which will be updated "atomically" (maybe
> some memory barriers needs to be added). After the updates of all the
> static keys are complete, the foo_use_variable gets unset.
> 
> The non-atomic portion of "foo_use_variable" is OK because the foo->key
> will match whatever the static_branch version it has.

That simply doesn't work.

Even *IF* memory stores would propagate instantly (they don't) you can
still have the boolean swap while in the middle of this state.

---

B = true;

CPU0			CPU1

 enqueue
   if (B)
     something++;

     			B = false;

 dequeue
   if (B)
     something--;


---

Will still be left with something unbalanced, even if everything is
super duper magically atomic.