linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH v2 10/11] mm/hmm: add helpers for driver to safely take the mmap

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Date:   Thu, 28 Mar 2019 11:44:08 -0700
From:   Ira Weiny <ira.weiny@...el.com>
To:     John Hubbard <jhubbard@...dia.com>
Cc:     Jerome Glisse <jglisse@...hat.com>, linux-mm@...ck.org,
        linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
        Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
        Dan Williams <dan.j.williams@...el.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 10/11] mm/hmm: add helpers for driver to safely take
 the mmap_sem v2

On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 04:34:04PM -0700, John Hubbard wrote:
> On 3/28/19 4:24 PM, Jerome Glisse wrote:
> > On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 04:20:37PM -0700, John Hubbard wrote:
> >> On 3/28/19 4:05 PM, Jerome Glisse wrote:
> >>> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 03:43:33PM -0700, John Hubbard wrote:
> >>>> On 3/28/19 3:40 PM, Jerome Glisse wrote:
> >>>>> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 03:25:39PM -0700, John Hubbard wrote:
> >>>>>> On 3/28/19 3:08 PM, Jerome Glisse wrote:
> >>>>>>> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 02:41:02PM -0700, John Hubbard wrote:
> >>>>>>>> On 3/28/19 2:30 PM, Jerome Glisse wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> On Thu, Mar 28, 2019 at 01:54:01PM -0700, John Hubbard wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>> On 3/25/19 7:40 AM, jglisse@...hat.com wrote:
> >>>>>>>>>>> From: Jérôme Glisse <jglisse@...hat.com>
> >>>>>> [...]
> >>>>>> OK, so let's either drop this patch, or if merge windows won't allow that,
> >>>>>> then *eventually* drop this patch. And instead, put in a hmm_sanity_check()
> >>>>>> that does the same checks.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> RDMA depends on this, so does the nouveau patchset that convert to new API.
> >>>>> So i do not see reason to drop this. They are user for this they are posted
> >>>>> and i hope i explained properly the benefit.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> It is a common pattern. Yes it only save couple lines of code but down the
> >>>>> road i will also help for people working on the mmap_sem patchset.
> >>>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> It *adds* a couple of lines that are misleading, because they look like they
> >>>> make things safer, but they don't actually do so.
> >>>
> >>> It is not about safety, sorry if it confused you but there is nothing about
> >>> safety here, i can add a big fat comment that explains that there is no safety
> >>> here. The intention is to allow the page fault handler that potential have
> >>> hundred of page fault queue up to abort as soon as it sees that it is pointless
> >>> to keep faulting on a dying process.
> >>>
> >>> Again if we race it is _fine_ nothing bad will happen, we are just doing use-
> >>> less work that gonna be thrown on the floor and we are just slowing down the
> >>> process tear down.
> >>>
> >>
> >> In addition to a comment, how about naming this thing to indicate the above 
> >> intention?  I have a really hard time with this odd down_read() wrapper, which
> >> allows code to proceed without really getting a lock. It's just too wrong-looking.
> >> If it were instead named:
> >>
> >> 	hmm_is_exiting()
> > 
> > What about: hmm_lock_mmap_if_alive() ?
> > 
> 
> That's definitely better, but I want to vote for just doing a check, not 
> taking any locks.
> 
> I'm not super concerned about the exact name, but I really want a routine that
> just checks (and optionally asserts, via WARN or BUG), and that's *all*. Then
> drivers can scatter that around like pixie dust as they see fit. Maybe right before
> taking a lock, maybe in other places. Decoupled from locking.

I agree.  Names matter and any function which is called *_down_read and could
potentially not take the lock should be called try_*_down_read.  Furthermore
users should be checking the return values from any try_*.

It is also odd that we are calling "down/up" on something which is not a
semaphore.  So the user here needs to _know_ that they are really getting the
lock on the mm which sits behind the scenes.  What John is proposing is more
explicit when reading driver code.

Ira

> 
> thanks,
> -- 
> John Hubbard
> NVIDIA
>