Re: [PATCH v2 10/10] thp: implement refcounting for huge zero page

[Kirill A. Shutemov]

On Mon, Sep 10, 2012 at 04:48:07PM +0200, Eric Dumazet wrote:
> On Mon, 2012-09-10 at 17:44 +0300, Kirill A. Shutemov wrote:
> > On Mon, Sep 10, 2012 at 04:02:39PM +0200, Eric Dumazet wrote:
> > > On Mon, 2012-09-10 at 16:13 +0300, Kirill A. Shutemov wrote:
> > > > From: "Kirill A. Shutemov" <kirill.shutemov@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > > > 
> > > > H. Peter Anvin doesn't like huge zero page which sticks in memory forever
> > > > after the first allocation. Here's implementation of lockless refcounting
> > > > for huge zero page.
> > > > 
> > > ...
> > > 
> > > > +static unsigned long get_huge_zero_page(void)
> > > > +{
> > > > +	struct page *zero_page;
> > > > +retry:
> > > > +	if (likely(atomic_inc_not_zero(&huge_zero_refcount)))
> > > > +		return ACCESS_ONCE(huge_zero_pfn);
> > > > +
> > > > +	zero_page = alloc_pages(GFP_TRANSHUGE | __GFP_ZERO, HPAGE_PMD_ORDER);
> > > > +	if (!zero_page)
> > > > +		return 0;
> > > > +	if (cmpxchg(&huge_zero_pfn, 0, page_to_pfn(zero_page))) {
> > > > +		__free_page(zero_page);
> > > > +		goto retry;
> > > > +	}
> > > 
> > > This might break if preemption can happen here ?
> > > 
> > > The second thread might loop forever because huge_zero_refcount is 0,
> > > and huge_zero_pfn not zero.
> > 
> > I fail to see why the second thread might loop forever. Long time yes, but
> > forever?
> > 
> > Yes, disabling preemption before alloc_pages() and enabling after
> > atomic_set() looks reasonable. Thanks.
> 
> If you have one online cpu, and the second thread is real time or
> something like that, it wont give cpu back to preempted thread.

Okay, I see. I'll update the patch.

-- 
 Kirill A. Shutemov
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