Date:	Wed, 31 Dec 2008 10:59:58 +0200
From:	"wassim dagash" <wassim.dagash@...il.com>
To:	"KOSAKI Motohiro" <kosaki.motohiro@...fujitsu.com>
Cc:	"Mel Gorman" <mel@....ul.ie>, LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	linux-mm <linux-mm@...ck.org>,
	"Andrew Morton" <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	"Nick Piggin" <npiggin@...e.de>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] mm: stop kswapd's infinite loop at high order allocation

Hi ,
Thank you all for reviewing.
Why don't we implement a solution where the order is defined per zone?
I implemented such a solution for my kernel (2.6.18) and tested it, it
worked fine for me. Attached a patch with a solution for 2.6.28
(compile tested only).

On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 6:54 AM, KOSAKI Motohiro
<kosaki.motohiro@...fujitsu.com> wrote:
> Hi
>
> thank you for reviewing.
>
>>> ==
>>> From: KOSAKI Motohiro <kosaki.motohiro@...fujitsu.com>
>>> Subject: [PATCH] mm: kswapd stop infinite loop at high order allocation
>>>
>>> Wassim Dagash reported following kswapd infinite loop problem.
>>>
>>>   kswapd runs in some infinite loop trying to swap until order 10 of zone
>>>   highmem is OK, While zone higmem (as I understand) has nothing to do
>>>   with contiguous memory (cause there is no 1-1 mapping) which means
>>>   kswapd will continue to try to balance order 10 of zone highmem
>>>   forever (or until someone release a very large chunk of highmem).
>>>
>>> He proposed remove contenious checking on highmem at all.
>>> However hugepage on highmem need contenious highmem page.
>>>
>>
>> I'm lacking the original problem report, but contiguous order-10 pages are
>> indeed required for hugepages in highmem and reclaiming for them should not
>> be totally disabled at any point. While no 1-1 mapping exists for the kernel,
>> contiguity is still required.
>
> correct.
> but that's ok.
>
> my patch only change corner case bahavior and only disable high-order
> when priority==0. typical hugepage reclaim don't need and don't reach
> priority==0.
>
> and sorry. I agree with my "2nd loop"  word of the patch comment is a
> bit misleading.
>
>
>> kswapd gets a sc.order when it is known there is a process trying to get
>> high-order pages so it can reclaim at that order in an attempt to prevent
>> future direct reclaim at a high-order. Your patch does not appear to depend on
>> GFP_KERNEL at all so I found the comment misleading. Furthermore, asking it to
>> loop again at order-0 means it may scan and reclaim more memory unnecessarily
>> seeing as all_zones_ok was calculated based on a high-order value, not order-0.
>
> Yup. my patch doesn't depend on GFP_KERNEL.
>
> but, Why order-0 means it may scan more memory unnecessary?
> all_zones_ok() is calculated by zone_watermark_ok() and zone_watermark_ok()
> depend on order argument. and my patch set order variable to 0 too.
>
>
>> While constantly looping trying to balance for high-orders is indeed bad,
>> I'm unconvinced this is the correct change. As we have already gone through
>> a priorities and scanned everything at the high-order, would it not make
>> more sense to do just give up with something like the following?
>>
>>       /*
>>        * If zones are still not balanced, loop again and continue attempting
>>        * to rebalance the system. For high-order allocations, fragmentation
>>        * can prevent the zones being rebalanced no matter how hard kswapd
>>        * works, particularly on systems with little or no swap. For costly
>>        * orders, just give up and assume interested processes will either
>>        * direct reclaim or wake up kswapd as necessary.
>>        */
>>        if (!all_zones_ok && sc.order <= PAGE_ALLOC_COSTLY_ORDER) {
>>                cond_resched();
>>
>>                try_to_freeze();
>>
>>                goto loop_again;
>>        }
>>
>> I used PAGE_ALLOC_COSTLY_ORDER instead of sc.order == 0 because we are
>> expected to support allocations up to that order in a fairly reliable fashion.
>
> my comment is bellow.
>
>
>> =============
>> From: Mel Gorman <mel@....ul.ie>
>> Subject: [PATCH] mm: stop kswapd's infinite loop at high order allocation
>>
>>  kswapd runs in some infinite loop trying to swap until order 10 of zone
>>  highmem is OK.... kswapd will continue to try to balance order 10 of zone
>>  highmem forever (or until someone release a very large chunk of highmem).
>>
>> For costly high-order allocations, the system may never be balanced due to
>> fragmentation but kswapd should not infinitely loop as a result. The
>> following patch lets kswapd stop reclaiming in the event it cannot
>> balance zones and the order is high-order.
>>
>> Reported-by: wassim dagash <wassim.dagash@...il.com>
>> Signed-off-by: Mel Gorman <mel@....ul.ie>
>>
>> diff --git a/mm/vmscan.c b/mm/vmscan.c
>> index 62e7f62..03ed9a0 100644
>> --- a/mm/vmscan.c
>> +++ b/mm/vmscan.c
>> @@ -1867,7 +1867,16 @@ out:
>>
>>                zone->prev_priority = temp_priority[i];
>>        }
>> -       if (!all_zones_ok) {
>> +
>> +       /*
>> +        * If zones are still not balanced, loop again and continue attempting
>> +        * to rebalance the system. For high-order allocations, fragmentation
>> +        * can prevent the zones being rebalanced no matter how hard kswapd
>> +        * works, particularly on systems with little or no swap. For costly
>> +        * orders, just give up and assume interested processes will either
>> +        * direct reclaim or wake up kswapd as necessary.
>> +        */
>> +       if (!all_zones_ok && sc.order <= PAGE_ALLOC_COSTLY_ORDER) {
>>                cond_resched();
>>
>>                try_to_freeze();
>
> this patch seems no good.
> kswapd come this point every SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX reclaimed because to avoid
> unnecessary priority variable decreasing.
> then "nr_reclaimed >= SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX" indicate kswapd need reclaim more.
>
> kswapd purpose is "reclaim until pages_high", not reclaim
> SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX pages.
>
> if your patch applied and kswapd start to reclaim for hugepage, kswapd
> exit balance_pgdat() function after to reclaim only 32 pages
> (SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX).
>
> In the other hand, "nr_reclaimed < SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX" mean kswapd can't
> reclaim enough
> page although priority == 0.
> in this case, retry is worthless.
>
> sorting out again.
> "goto loop_again" reaching happend by two case.
>
> 1. kswapd reclaimed SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX pages.
>    at that time, kswapd reset priority variable to prevent
> unnecessary priority decreasing.
>    I don't hope this behavior change.
> 2. kswapd scanned until priority==0.
>    this case is debatable. my patch reset any order to 0. but
> following code is also considerable to me. (sorry for tab corrupted,
> current my mail environment is very poor)
>
>
> code-A:
>       if (!all_zones_ok) {
>              if ((nr_reclaimed >= SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX) ||
>                 (sc.order <= PAGE_ALLOC_COSTLY_ORDER)) {
>                          cond_resched();
>                           try_to_freeze();
>                           goto loop_again;
>                }
>       }
>
> or
>
> code-B:
>       if (!all_zones_ok) {
>              cond_resched();
>               try_to_freeze();
>
>              if (nr_reclaimed >= SWAP_CLUSTER_MAX)
>                           goto loop_again;
>
>              if (sc.order <= PAGE_ALLOC_COSTLY_ORDER)) {
>                           order = sc.order = 0;
>                           goto loop_again;
>              }
>       }
>
>
> However, I still like my original proposal because ..
>  - code-A forget to order-1 (for stack) allocation also can cause
> infinite loop.
>  - code-B doesn't simpler than my original proposal.
>
> What do you think it?
>



-- 
too much is never enough!!!!!

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