Re: [PATCH v3 6/6] mm: gup: batch PTE-mapped large folios in gup_fast_pte_range()

From: David Hildenbrand (Arm)

Date: Tue Nov 10 2026 - 08:17:00 EST


On 11/9/26 13:32, Yeoreum Yun wrote:
> GUP-fast grabs a PTE-mapped large folio one page at a time. Every PTE
> costs a try_grab_folio_fast() (a refcount cmpxchg, plus the pincount
> atomic, a full barrier and a node stat update for FOLL_PIN), a
> gup_fast_folio_allowed() and a folio_set_referenced(), so a 64 kB mTHP
> pays sixteen of each and a PTE-mapped 2 MB THP pays 512.
>
> The users are the hot ones: iov_iter_extract_user_pages() pins every
> O_DIRECT buffer through pin_user_pages_fast(), io_uring registers its
> buffers through it, and so does RDMA memory registration.
> With mTHP those buffers are PTE-mapped large folios.
>
> After the head page has been grabbed and verified as before, extend the
> run to the following PTEs that map the next pages of the same folio
> with the same protection bits, take the remaining references for the
> run with try_grab_folio(), and fill pages[] from the run.
> The PTEs of the run are read while the reference on the folio is held,
> so the folio can neither be collapsed, freed nor split underneath the scan.
> A read-only run of an anonymous folio stops at the first page
> that gup_must_unshare() rejects, so the per-page exclusivity guarantee for
> FOLL_PIN is kept.
>
> folio_pte_batch_flags() does the scan. It reads the entries with
> ptep_get(), which is not safe without the page table lock on
> CONFIG_GUP_GET_PXX_LOW_HIGH (x86 PAE, mips32, sh) or with arm64 contpte,
> and GUP-fast reads every PTE with ptep_get_lockless() for that reason.
> Add FPB_LOCKLESS to make the helper do the same; it is inlined per call
> site, so the other callers do not change.
>
> The order-0 path keeps its instruction sequence. The folio flags are
> tested before folio_set_referenced() on purpose: a load of the flags
> right after that locked instruction cost about 25% on order-0 pages in
> the gup_test benchmark below, and reading them first brings that path
> back to the baseline.
>
> gup_test ioctl over a 256 MB anonymous region, FOLL_WRITE, 65536 pages
> per call, median of 15 runs, two baseline boots / one patched boot, on
> an x86-64 VM:
>
> get_user_pages_fast() pin_user_pages_fast()
> before after before after
> 4 kB pages 849/789 us 783 us 1174/1138 us 1094 us
> 64 kB mTHP 812/811 us 126 us 1215/1113 us 188 us
> 1 MB mTHP 799/774 us 59 us 1185/1077 us 64 us
> 2 MB THP, PTE-mapped 803/786 us 57 us 1159/1120 us 58 us
> 2 MB THP, PMD-mapped 42/40 us 40 us 46/41 us 42 us
>
> fio O_DIRECT randread of a null_blk device (CPU bound) with the I/O
> buffer in 64 kB mTHP, median of 15 five-second runs:
>
> bs=1M psync 126.2/125.6 GB/s -> 220.6 GB/s
> bs=1M io_uring, iodepth 16 71.2/71.6 GB/s -> 112.1 GB/s
> bs=64k io_uring, iodepth 16 50.2/50.7 GB/s -> 60.1 GB/s
>
> IORING_REGISTER_BUFFERS of 1 GB, median of 15:
>
> 64 kB mTHP 6179/5998 us -> 1599 us
> 1 MB mTHP 5790/5801 us -> 893 us
> 4 kB pages 7173/6741 us -> 6763 us
>
> Signed-off-by: Yuan-Hao Hsu <aa9736195201@xxxxxxxxx>

There should likely be a co-developed-by? (also in the other one?)

LGTM, thanks.

Reviewed-by: David Hildenbrand (Arm) <david@xxxxxxxxxx>

--
Cheers,

David