linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH V2 7/9] vhost: do not use RCU to synchronize MMU notifier with worker

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Message-ID: <4b448aa5-2c92-a6ca-67d6-d30fad67254c@redhat.com>
Date:   Wed, 7 Aug 2019 14:49:57 +0800
From:   Jason Wang <jasowang@...hat.com>
To:     Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@...pe.ca>
Cc:     mst@...hat.com, kvm@...r.kernel.org,
        virtualization@...ts.linux-foundation.org, netdev@...r.kernel.org,
        linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, linux-mm@...ck.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH V2 7/9] vhost: do not use RCU to synchronize MMU notifier
 with worker


On 2019/8/6 下午8:04, Jason Gunthorpe wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 05, 2019 at 12:20:45PM +0800, Jason Wang wrote:
>> On 2019/8/2 下午8:46, Jason Gunthorpe wrote:
>>> On Fri, Aug 02, 2019 at 05:40:07PM +0800, Jason Wang wrote:
>>>>> This must be a proper barrier, like a spinlock, mutex, or
>>>>> synchronize_rcu.
>>>> I start with synchronize_rcu() but both you and Michael raise some
>>>> concern.
>>> I've also idly wondered if calling synchronize_rcu() under the various
>>> mm locks is a deadlock situation.
>>
>> Maybe, that's why I suggest to use vhost_work_flush() which is much
>> lightweight can can achieve the same function. It can guarantee all previous
>> work has been processed after vhost_work_flush() return.
> If things are already running in a work, then yes, you can piggyback
> on the existing spinlocks inside the workqueue and be Ok
>
> However, if that work is doing any copy_from_user, then the flush
> becomes dependent on swap and it won't work again...


Yes it do copy_from_user(), so we can't do this.


>
>>>> 1) spinlock: add lots of overhead on datapath, this leads 0 performance
>>>> improvement.
>>> I think the topic here is correctness not performance improvement>
>   
>> But the whole series is to speed up vhost.
> So? Starting with a whole bunch of crazy, possibly broken, locking and
> claiming a performance win is not reasonable.


Yes, I admit this patch is tricky, I'm not going to push this. Will post 
a V3.


>
>> Spinlock is correct but make the whole series meaningless consider it won't
>> bring any performance improvement.
> You can't invent a faster spinlock by opencoding some wild
> scheme. There is nothing special about the usage here, it needs a
> blocking lock, plain and simple.
>
> Jason


Will post V3. Let's see if you are happy with that version.

Thanks