linux-kernel - Re: Confusing lockdep splat

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Date:   Sat, 25 Sep 2021 05:55:39 -0700
From:   "Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@...nel.org>
To:     Waiman Long <llong@...hat.com>
Cc:     peterz@...radead.org, mingo@...hat.com, will@...nel.org,
        boqun.feng@...il.com, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, richard@....at
Subject: Re: Confusing lockdep splat

On Fri, Sep 24, 2021 at 08:30:20PM -0400, Waiman Long wrote:
> On 9/24/21 6:43 PM, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > On Fri, Sep 24, 2021 at 05:41:17PM -0400, Waiman Long wrote:
> > > On 9/24/21 5:02 PM, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > > > Hello!
> > > > 
> > > > I got the lockdep splat below from an SRCU-T rcutorture run, which uses
> > > > a !SMP !PREEMPT kernel.  This is a random event, and about half the time
> > > > it happens within an hour or two.  My reproducer (on current -rcu "dev"
> > > > branch for a 16-CPU system) is:
> > > > 
> > > > 	tools/testing/selftests/rcutorture/bin/kvm.sh --cpus 16 --configs "16*SRCU-T" --duration 7200
> > > > 
> > > > My points of confusion are as follows:
> > > > 
> > > > 1.	The locks involved in this deadlock cycle are irq-disabled
> > > > 	raw spinlocks.	The claimed deadlock cycle uses two CPUs.
> > > > 	There is only one CPU.	There is no possibility of preemption
> > > > 	or interrupts.	So how can this deadlock actually happen?
> > > > 
> > > > 2.	If there was more than one CPU, then yes, there would be
> > > > 	a deadlock.  The PI lock is acquired by the wakeup code after
> > > > 	acquiring the workqueue lock, and rcutorture tests the new ability
> > > > 	of the scheduler to hold the PI lock across rcu_read_unlock(),
> > > > 	and while it is at it, across the rest of the unlock primitives.
> > > > 
> > > > 	But if there was more than one CPU, Tree SRCU would be used
> > > > 	instead of Tiny SRCU, and there would be no wakeup invoked from
> > > > 	srcu_read_unlock().
> > > > 
> > > > 	Given only one CPU, there is no way to complete the deadlock
> > > > 	cycle.
> > > > 
> > > > For now, I am working around this by preventing rcutorture from holding
> > > > the PI lock across Tiny srcu_read_unlock().
> > > > 
> > > > Am I missing something subtle here?
> > > I would say that the lockdep code just doesn't have enough intelligence to
> > > identify that deadlock is not possible in this special case. There are
> > > certainly false positives, and it can be hard to get rid of them.
> > Would it make sense for lockdep to filter out reports involving more
> > than one CPU unless there is at least one sleeplock in the cycle?
> > 
> > Of course, it gets more complicated when interrupts are involved...
> 
> Actually, lockdep keeps track of all the possible lock orderings and put out
> a splat whenever these lock orderings suggest that a circular deadlock is
> possible. It doesn't keep track if a lock is sleepable or not. Also lockdep
> deals with lock classes each of which can have many instances. So all the
> pi_lock's in different task_struct's are all treated as the same lock from
> lockdep's perspective. We can't treat all different instances separately or
> we will run out of lockdep table space very quickly.

We shouldn't need additional classes, but only instead a marking of a
given lock class to tell whether or not it was a sleeplock.  Either way,
I now have a workaround within Tiny SRCU that appears to handle this case,
so it is not as urgent as it might be.

							Thanx, Paul