Date:   Mon, 21 May 2018 15:50:10 +0200
From:   Roman Penyaev <roman.penyaev@...fitbricks.com>
To:     "Paul E . McKenney" <paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com>
Cc:     linux-block <linux-block@...r.kernel.org>,
        linux-rdma <linux-rdma@...r.kernel.org>,
        Jens Axboe <axboe@...nel.dk>,
        Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org>,
        Sagi Grimberg <sagi@...mberg.me>,
        Bart Van Assche <bart.vanassche@...disk.com>,
        Or Gerlitz <ogerlitz@...lanox.com>,
        Doug Ledford <dledford@...hat.com>,
        Swapnil Ingle <swapnil.ingle@...fitbricks.com>,
        Danil Kipnis <danil.kipnis@...fitbricks.com>,
        Jack Wang <jinpu.wang@...fitbricks.com>,
        Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 01/26] rculist: introduce list_next_or_null_rr_rcu()

On Sun, May 20, 2018 at 2:43 AM, Paul E. McKenney
<paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com> wrote:
> On Sat, May 19, 2018 at 10:20:48PM +0200, Roman Penyaev wrote:
>> On Sat, May 19, 2018 at 6:37 PM, Paul E. McKenney
>> <paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com> wrote:
>> > On Fri, May 18, 2018 at 03:03:48PM +0200, Roman Pen wrote:
>> >> Function is going to be used in transport over RDMA module
>> >> in subsequent patches.
>> >>
>> >> Function returns next element in round-robin fashion,
>> >> i.e. head will be skipped.  NULL will be returned if list
>> >> is observed as empty.
>> >>
>> >> Signed-off-by: Roman Pen <roman.penyaev@...fitbricks.com>
>> >> Cc: Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com>
>> >> Cc: linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
>> >> ---
>> >>  include/linux/rculist.h | 19 +++++++++++++++++++
>> >>  1 file changed, 19 insertions(+)
>> >>
>> >> diff --git a/include/linux/rculist.h b/include/linux/rculist.h
>> >> index 127f534fec94..b0840d5ab25a 100644
>> >> --- a/include/linux/rculist.h
>> >> +++ b/include/linux/rculist.h
>> >> @@ -339,6 +339,25 @@ static inline void list_splice_tail_init_rcu(struct list_head *list,
>> >>  })
>> >>
>> >>  /**
>> >> + * list_next_or_null_rr_rcu - get next list element in round-robin fashion.
>> >> + * @head:    the head for the list.
>> >> + * @ptr:        the list head to take the next element from.
>> >> + * @type:       the type of the struct this is embedded in.
>> >> + * @memb:       the name of the list_head within the struct.
>> >> + *
>> >> + * Next element returned in round-robin fashion, i.e. head will be skipped,
>> >> + * but if list is observed as empty, NULL will be returned.
>> >> + *
>> >> + * This primitive may safely run concurrently with the _rcu list-mutation
>> >> + * primitives such as list_add_rcu() as long as it's guarded by rcu_read_lock().
>> >
>> > Of course, all the set of list_next_or_null_rr_rcu() invocations that
>> > are round-robining a given list must all be under the same RCU read-side
>> > critical section.  For example, the following will break badly:
>> >
>> >         struct foo *take_rr_step(struct list_head *head, struct foo *ptr)
>> >         {
>> >                 struct foo *ret;
>> >
>> >                 rcu_read_lock();
>> >                 ret = list_next_or_null_rr_rcu(head, ptr, struct foo, foolist);
>> >                 rcu_read_unlock();  /* BUG */
>> >                 return ret;
>> >         }
>> >
>> > You need a big fat comment stating this, at the very least.  The resulting
>> > bug can be very hard to trigger and even harder to debug.
>> >
>> > And yes, I know that the same restriction applies to list_next_rcu()
>> > and friends.  The difference is that if you try to invoke those in an
>> > infinite loop, you will be rapped on the knuckles as soon as you hit
>> > the list header.  Without that knuckle-rapping, RCU CPU stall warnings
>> > might tempt people to do something broken like take_rr_step() above.
>>
>> Hi Paul,
>>
>> I need -rr behaviour for doing IO load-balancing when I choose next RDMA
>> connection from the list in order to send a request, i.e. my code is
>> something like the following:
>>
>>         static struct conn *get_and_set_next_conn(void)
>>         {
>>                 struct conn *conn;
>>
>>                 conn = rcu_dereferece(rcu_conn);
>>                 if (unlikely(!conn))
>>                     return conn;
>
> Wait.  Don't you need to restart from the beginning of the list in
> this case?  Or does the list never have anything added to it and is
> rcu_conn initially the first element in the list?

Hi Paul,

No, I continue from the pointer, which I assigned on the previous IO
in order to send IO fairly and keep load balanced.

Initially @rcu_conn points to the first element, but elements can
be deleted from the list and list can become empty.

The deletion code is below.

>
>>                 conn = list_next_or_null_rr_rcu(&conn_list,
>>                                                 &conn->entry,
>>                                                 typeof(*conn),
>>                                                 entry);
>>                 rcu_assign_pointer(rcu_conn, conn);
>
> Linus is correct to doubt this code.  You assign a pointer to the current
> element to rcu_conn, which is presumably a per-CPU or global variable.
> So far, so good ...

I use per-CPU, in the first example I did not show that not to overcomplicate
the code.

>
>>                 return conn;
>>         }
>>
>>         rcu_read_lock();
>>         conn = get_and_set_next_conn();
>>         if (unlikely(!conn)) {
>>                 /* ... */
>>         }
>>         err = rdma_io(conn, request);
>>         rcu_read_unlock();
>
> ... except that some other CPU might well remove the entry referenced by
> rcu_conn at this point.  It would have to wait for a grace period (e.g.,
> synchronize_rcu()), but the current CPU has exited its RCU read-side
> critical section, and therefore is not blocking the grace period.
> Therefore, by the time get_and_set_next_conn() picks up rcu_conn, it
> might well be referencing the freelist, or, even worse, some other type
> of structure.
>
> What is your code doing to prevent this from happening?  (There are ways,
> but I want to know what you were doing in this case.)

Probably I should have shown the way of removal at the very beginning,
my fault.  So deletion looks as the following (a bit changed and
simplified for the sake of clearness):

        static void remove_connection(conn)
        {
                bool need_to_wait = false;
                int cpu;

                /* Do not let RCU list add/delete happen in parallel */
                mutex_lock(&conn_lock);

                list_del_rcu(&conn->entry);

                /* Make sure everybody observes element removal */
                synchronize_rcu();

                /*
                 * At this point nobody sees @conn in the list, but
still we have
                 * dangling pointer @rcu_conn which _can_ point to @conn.  Since
                 * nobody can observe @conn in the list, we guarantee
that IO path
                 * will not assign @conn to @rcu_conn, i.e. @rcu_conn
can be equal
                 * to @conn, but can never again become @conn.
                 */

                /*
                 * Get @next connection from current @conn which is going to be
                 * removed.
                 */
                next = list_next_or_null_rr_rcu(&conn_list, &conn->entry,
                                                typeof(*next), entry);

                /*
                 * Here @rcu_conn can be changed by reader side, so use @cmpxchg
                 * in order to keep fairness in load-balancing and do not touch
                 * the pointer which can be already changed by the IO path.
                 *
                 * Current path can be faster than IO path and the
following race
                 * exists:
                 *
                 *   CPU0                         CPU1
                 *   ----                         ----
                 *   conn = rcu_dereferece(rcu_conn);
                 *   next = list_next_or_null_rr_rcu(conn)
                 *
                 *                                conn ==
cmpxchg(rcu_conn, conn, next);
                 *                                synchronize_rcu();
                 *
                 *   rcu_assign_pointer(rcu_conn, next);
                 *   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
                 *
                 *   Here @rcu_conn is already equal to @next (done by
@cmpxchg),
                 *   so assignment to the same pointer is harmless.
                 *
                 */
                for_each_possible_cpu(cpu) {
                        struct conn **rcu_conn;

                        rcu_conn = per_cpu_ptr(pcpu_rcu_conn, cpu);
                        if (*rcu_conn != conn)
                                /*
                                 * This @cpu will never again pick up @conn,
                                 * so it is safe just to choose next CPU.
                                 */
                                continue;

                        if (conn == cmpxchg(rcu_conn, conn, next))
                                /*
                                 * @rcu_conn was successfully replaced
with @next,
                                 * that means that someone can also hold a @conn
                                 * and dereferencing it, so wait for a
grace period
                                 * is required.
                                 */
                                need_to_wait = true;
                }
                if (need_to_wait)
                        synchronize_rcu();

                mutex_unlock(&conn_lock);

                kfree(conn);
        }


>
>> i.e. usage of the @next pointer is under an RCU critical section.
>>
>> > Is it possible to instead do some sort of list_for_each_entry_rcu()-like
>> > macro that makes it more obvious that the whole thing need to be under
>> > a single RCU read-side critical section?  Such a macro would of course be
>> > an infinite loop if the list never went empty, so presumably there would
>> > be a break or return statement in there somewhere.
>>
>> The difference is that I do not need a loop, I take the @next conn pointer,
>> save it for the following IO request and do IO for current IO request.
>>
>> It seems list_for_each_entry_rcu()-like with immediate "break" in the body
>> of the loop does not look nice, I personally do not like it, i.e.:
>>
>>
>>         static struct conn *get_and_set_next_conn(void)
>>         {
>>                 struct conn *conn;
>>
>>                 conn = rcu_dereferece(rcu_conn);
>>                 if (unlikely(!conn))
>>                     return conn;
>>                 list_for_each_entry_rr_rcu(conn, &conn_list,
>>                                            entry) {
>>                         break;
>>                 }
>>                 rcu_assign_pointer(rcu_conn, conn);
>>                 return conn;
>>         }
>>
>>
>> or maybe I did not fully get your idea?
>
> That would not help at all because you are still leaking the pointer out
> of the RCU read-side critical section.  That is completely and utterly
> broken unless you are somehow cleaning up rcu_conn when you remove
> the element.  And getting that cleanup right is -extremely- tricky.
> Unless you have some sort of proof of correctness, you will get a NACK
> from me.

I understand all the consequences of the leaking pointer, and of course
wrapped loop with RCU lock/unlock is simpler, but in order to keep
load-balancing and IO fairness avoiding any locks on IO path I've come
up with these RCU tricks and list_next_or_null_rr_rcu() macro.

> More like this:
>
>         list_for_each_entry_rr_rcu(conn, &conn_list, entry) {
>                 do_something_with(conn);
>                 if (done_for_now())
>                         break;
>         }
>
>> >> + */
>> >> +#define list_next_or_null_rr_rcu(head, ptr, type, memb) \
>> >> +({ \
>> >> +     list_next_or_null_rcu(head, ptr, type, memb) ?: \
>> >> +             list_next_or_null_rcu(head, READ_ONCE((ptr)->next), type, memb); \
>> >
>> > Are there any uses for this outside of RDMA?  If not, I am with Linus.
>> > Define this within RDMA, where a smaller number of people can more
>> > easily be kept aware of the restrictions on use.  If it turns out to be
>> > more generally useful, we can take a look at exactly what makes sense
>> > more globally.
>>
>> The only one list_for_each_entry_rcu()-like macro I am aware of is used in
>> block/blk-mq-sched.c, is called list_for_each_entry_rcu_rr():
>>
>> https://elixir.bootlin.com/linux/v4.17-rc5/source/block/blk-mq-sched.c#L370
>>
>> Does it make sense to implement generic list_next_or_null_rr_rcu() reusing
>> my list_next_or_null_rr_rcu() variant?
>
> Let's start with the basics:  It absolutely does not make sense to leak
> pointers across rcu_read_unlock() unless you have arranged something else
> to protect the pointed-to data in the meantime.  There are a number of ways
> of implementing this protection.  Again, what protection are you using?
>
> Your code at the above URL looks plausible to me at first glance: You
> do rcu_read_lock(), a loop with list_for_each_entry_rcu_rr(), then
> rcu_read_unlock().  But at second glance, it looks like htcx->queue
> might have the same vulnerability as rcu_conn in your earlier code.

I am not the author of the code at the URL I specified. I provided the
link answering the question to show other possible users of round-robin
semantics for RCU list traversal.  In my 'list_next_or_null_rr_rcu()'
case I can't use a loop, I leak the pointer and indeed have to be very
careful.  But perhaps we can come up with some generic solution to cover
both cases: -rr loop and -rr next.

--
Roman

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