linux-kernel - Re: [RFC PATCH] mm/vmalloc: fix vmalloc which may return null if called with __GFP

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Date: Wed, 8 May 2024 23:10:46 +0800
From: Gao Xiang <hsiangkao@...ux.alibaba.com>
To: Hailong Liu <hailong.liu@...o.com>
Cc: akpm@...ux-foundation.org, Michal Hocko <mhocko@...e.com>,
 urezki@...il.com, hch@...radead.org, lstoakes@...il.com, 21cnbao@...il.com,
 linux-mm@...ck.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, xiang@...nel.org,
 chao@...nel.org, Oven <liyangouwen1@...o.com>
Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH] mm/vmalloc: fix vmalloc which may return null if
 called with __GFP_NOFAIL

Hi,

On 2024/5/8 22:43, Hailong Liu wrote:
> On Wed, 08. May 21:41, Gao Xiang wrote:
>>
>> +Cc Michal,
>>
>> On 2024/5/8 20:58, hailong.liu@...o.com wrote:
>>> From: "Hailong.Liu" <hailong.liu@...o.com>
>>>
>>> Commit a421ef303008 ("mm: allow !GFP_KERNEL allocations for kvmalloc")
>>> includes support for __GFP_NOFAIL, but it presents a conflict with
>>> commit dd544141b9eb ("vmalloc: back off when the current task is
>>> OOM-killed"). A possible scenario is as belows:
>>>
>>> process-a
>>> kvcalloc(n, m, GFP_KERNEL | __GFP_NOFAIL)
>>>       __vmalloc_node_range()
>>> 	__vmalloc_area_node()
>>> 	    vm_area_alloc_pages()
>>>               --> oom-killer send SIGKILL to process-a
>>>               if (fatal_signal_pending(current)) break;
>>> --> return NULL;
>>>
>>> to fix this, do not check fatal_signal_pending() in vm_area_alloc_pages()
>>> if __GFP_NOFAIL set.
>>>
>>> Reported-by: Oven <liyangouwen1@...o.com>
>>> Signed-off-by: Hailong.Liu <hailong.liu@...o.com>
>>
>> Why taging this as RFC here?  It seems a corner-case fix of
>> commit a421ef303008
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Gao Xiang
>>
> 
> Hi Gao Xiang:
> 
> RFC here to wait for a better way to handle this case :).
> IMO, if vmalloc support __GFP_NOFAIL it should not return
> null even system is deadlock on memory.

The starting point is that kmalloc doesn't support __GFP_NOFAIL
if order > 1 (even for very short temporary uses), see:
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/mm/page_alloc.c?h=v6.8#n2896

but it is possible if we have such page pointer array (since two
(order-1) pages can only keep 1024 8-byte entries, it can happen
if compression ratios are high), and kvmalloc(__GFP_NOFAIL) has
already been supported for almost two years, it will fallback to
order-0 allocation as described in commit e9c3cda4d86e
("mm, vmalloc: fix high order __GFP_NOFAIL allocations").

With my limited understanding, I'm not sure why it can cause
deadlock here since it will fallback to order-0 allocation then,
and such allocation is just for short temporary uses again
because kmalloc doesn't support order > 1 short memory
allocation strictly.

Thanks,
Gao Xiang

> 
> --
> 
> Best Regards,
> Hailong.