Re: [PATCH 1/2] KVM: x86/pmu: Reset perf_capabilities in vcpu to 0 if PDCM is disabled

[Sean Christopherson]

On Wed, Jan 24, 2024, Mingwei Zhang wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 24, 2024, Sean Christopherson wrote:
> > On Wed, Jan 24, 2024, Aaron Lewis wrote:
> > > On Wed, Jan 24, 2024 at 7:49 AM Sean Christopherson <seanjc@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On Wed, Jan 24, 2024, Mingwei Zhang wrote:
> > > > No, this is just papering over the underlying bug.  KVM shouldn't be stuffing
> > > > vcpu->arch.perf_capabilities without explicit writes from host userspace.  E.g
> > > > KVM_SET_CPUID{,2} is allowed multiple times, at which point KVM could clobber a
> > > > host userspace write to MSR_IA32_PERF_CAPABILITIES.  It's unlikely any userspace
> > > > actually does something like that, but KVM overwriting guest state is almost
> > > > never a good thing.
> > > >
> > > > I've been meaning to send a patch for a long time (IIRC, Aaron also ran into this?).
> > > > KVM needs to simply not stuff vcpu->arch.perf_capabilities.  I believe we are
> > > > already fudging around this in our internal kernels, so I don't think there's a
> > > > need to carry a hack-a-fix for the destination kernel.
> > > >
> > > > diff --git a/arch/x86/kvm/x86.c b/arch/x86/kvm/x86.c
> > > > index 27e23714e960..fdef9d706d61 100644
> > > > --- a/arch/x86/kvm/x86.c
> > > > +++ b/arch/x86/kvm/x86.c
> > > > @@ -12116,7 +12116,6 @@ int kvm_arch_vcpu_create(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu)
> > > >
> > > >         kvm_async_pf_hash_reset(vcpu);
> > > >
> > > > -       vcpu->arch.perf_capabilities = kvm_caps.supported_perf_cap;
> > > 
> > > Yeah, that will fix the issue we are seeing.  The only thing that's
> > > not clear to me is if userspace should expect KVM to set this or if
> > > KVM should expect userspace to set this.  How is that generally
> > > decided?
> > 
> > By "this", you mean the effective RESET value for vcpu->arch.perf_capabilities?
> > To be consistent with KVM's CPUID module at vCPU creation, which is completely
> > empty (vCPU has no PMU and no PDCM support) KVM *must* zero
> > vcpu->arch.perf_capabilities.
> > 
> > If userspace wants a non-zero value, then userspace needs to set CPUID to enable
> > PDCM and set MSR_IA32_PERF_CAPABILITIES.
> > 
> > MSR_IA32_ARCH_CAPABILITIES is in the same boat, e.g. a vCPU without
> > X86_FEATURE_ARCH_CAPABILITIES can end up seeing a non-zero MSR value.  That too
> > should be excised.
> > 
> hmm, does that mean KVM just allows an invalid vcpu state exist from
> host point of view?

Yes.

https://lore.kernel.org/all/ZC4qF90l77m3X1Ir@xxxxxxxxxx

> I think this makes a lot of confusions on migration where VMM on the source
> believes that a non-zero value from KVM_GET_MSRS is valid and the VMM on the
> target will find it not true.

Yes, but seeing a non-zero value is a KVM bug that should be fixed.

> If we follow the suggestion by removing the initial value at vCPU
> creation time, then I think it breaks the existing VMM code, since that
> requires VMM to explicitly set the MSR, which I am not sure we do today.

Yeah, I'm hoping we can squeak by without breaking existing setups.

I'm 99% certain QEMU is ok, as QEMU has explicitly set MSR_IA32_PERF_CAPABILITIES
since support for PDCM/PERF_CAPABILITIES was added by commit ea39f9b643
("target/i386: define a new MSR based feature word - FEAT_PERF_CAPABILITIES").

Frankly, if our VMM doesn't do the same, then it's wildly busted.  Relying on
KVM to define the vCPU is irresponsible, to put it nicely.

> The following code below is different. The key difference is that the
> following code preserves a valid value, but this case is to not preserve
> an invalid value. 

But it's a completely different fix.  I referenced that commit to call out that
the need for the commit and changelog suggests that someone (*cough* us) is relying
on KVM to initialize MSR_PLATFORM_INFO, and has been doing so for a very long time.
That doesn't mean it's the correct KVM behavior, just that it's much riskier to
change.