linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 2/3] x86: Define _PAGE_NUMA with unused physical address bits PMD and PTE levels

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Date:	Mon, 7 Apr 2014 16:49:35 +0100
From:	Mel Gorman <mgorman@...e.de>
To:	David Vrabel <david.vrabel@...rix.com>
Cc:	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Cyrill Gorcunov <gorcunov@...il.com>,
	Peter Anvin <hpa@...or.com>, Ingo Molnar <mingo@...nel.org>,
	Steven Noonan <steven@...inklabs.net>,
	Rik van Riel <riel@...hat.com>,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Peter Zijlstra <peterz@...radead.org>,
	Andrea Arcangeli <aarcange@...hat.com>,
	Linux-MM <linux-mm@...ck.org>, Linux-X86 <x86@...nel.org>,
	LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH 2/3] x86: Define _PAGE_NUMA with unused physical address
 bits PMD and PTE levels

On Mon, Apr 07, 2014 at 04:32:39PM +0100, David Vrabel wrote:
> On 07/04/14 16:10, Mel Gorman wrote:
> > _PAGE_NUMA is currently an alias of _PROT_PROTNONE to trap NUMA hinting
> > faults. As the bit is shared care is taken that _PAGE_NUMA is only used in
> > places where _PAGE_PROTNONE could not reach but this still causes problems
> > on Xen and conceptually difficult.
> 
> The problem with Xen guests occurred because mprotect() /was/ confusing
> PROTNONE mappings with _PAGE_NUMA and clearing the non-existant NUMA hints.
> 

I didn't bother spelling it out in case I gave the impression that I was
blaming Xen for the problem.  As the bit is now changes, does it help
the Xen problem or cause another collision of some sort? There is no
guarantee _PAGE_NUMA will remain as bit 62 but at worst it'll use bit 11
and NUMA_BALANCING will depend in !KMEMCHECK.

-- 
Mel Gorman
SUSE Labs
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