Re: [Patch 1/2] KVM: x86/pmu: Add Intel CPUID-hinted TopDown slots event

[Jim Mattson]

On Tue, Oct 31, 2023 at 6:59 PM Mi, Dapeng <dapeng1.mi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> On 11/1/2023 2:22 AM, Jim Mattson wrote:
> > On Tue, Oct 31, 2023 at 1:58 AM Dapeng Mi <dapeng1.mi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >> This patch adds support for the architectural topdown slots event which
> >> is hinted by CPUID.0AH.EBX.
> > Can't a guest already program an event selector to count event select
> > 0xa4, unit mask 1, unless the event is prohibited by
> > KVM_SET_PMU_EVENT_FILTER?
>
> Actually defining this new slots arch event is to do the sanity check
> for supported arch-events which is enumerated by CPUID.0AH.EBX.
> Currently vPMU would check if the arch event from guest is supported by
> KVM. If not, it would be rejected just like intel_hw_event_available()
> shows.
>
> If we don't add the slots event in the intel_arch_events[] array, guest
> may program the slots event and pass the sanity check of KVM on a
> platform which actually doesn't support slots event and program the
> event on a real GP counter and got an invalid count. This is not correct.

On physical hardware, it is possible to program a GP counter with the
event selector and unit mask of the slots event whether or not the
platform supports it. Isn't KVM wrong to disallow something that a
physical CPU allows?

> >
> > AFAICT, this change just enables event filtering based on
> > CPUID.0AH:EBX[bit 7] (though it's not clear to me why two independent
> > mechanisms are necessary for event filtering).
>
>
> IMO, these are two different things. this change is just to enable the
> supported arch events check for slot events, the event filtering is
> another thing.

How is clearing CPUID.0AH:EBX[bit 7] any different from putting {event
select 0xa4, unit mask 1} in a deny list with the PMU event filter?