linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 1/4] mm: abstract initial stack setup to mm subsystem

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Message-ID: <57e543a2-4c5a-445e-a3ab-affbea337d93@redhat.com>
Date: Thu, 24 Apr 2025 23:30:35 +0200
From: David Hildenbrand <david@...hat.com>
To: Lorenzo Stoakes <lorenzo.stoakes@...cle.com>,
 Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>
Cc: "Liam R . Howlett" <Liam.Howlett@...cle.com>,
 Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@...e.cz>, Jann Horn <jannh@...gle.com>,
 Pedro Falcato <pfalcato@...e.de>, Kees Cook <kees@...nel.org>,
 Alexander Viro <viro@...iv.linux.org.uk>,
 Christian Brauner <brauner@...nel.org>, Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>,
 Suren Baghdasaryan <surenb@...gle.com>, linux-mm@...ck.org,
 linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/4] mm: abstract initial stack setup to mm subsystem

On 24.04.25 23:15, Lorenzo Stoakes wrote:
> There are peculiarities within the kernel where what is very clearly mm
> code is performed elsewhere arbitrarily.
> 
> This violates separation of concerns and makes it harder to refactor code
> to make changes to how fundamental initialisation and operation of mm logic
> is performed.
> 
> One such case is the creation of the VMA containing the initial stack upon
> execve()'ing a new process. This is currently performed in __bprm_mm_init()
> in fs/exec.c.
> 
> Abstract this operation to create_init_stack_vma(). This allows us to limit
> use of vma allocation and free code to fork and mm only.
> 
> We previously did the same for the step at which we relocate the initial
> stack VMA downwards via relocate_vma_down(), now we move the initial VMA
> establishment too.
> 
> Signed-off-by: Lorenzo Stoakes <lorenzo.stoakes@...cle.com>
> ---
...

> +/*
> + * Establish the stack VMA in an execve'd process, located temporarily at the
> + * maximum stack address provided by the architecture.
> + *
> + * We later relocate this downwards in relocate_vma_down().
> + *
> + * This function is almost certainly NOT what you want for anything other than
> + * early executable initialisation.
> + *
> + * On success, returns 0 and sets *vmap to the stack VMA and *top_mem_p to the
> + * maximum addressable location in the stack (that is capable of storing a
> + * system word of data).
> + *
> + * on failure, returns an error code.
> + */

I was about to say, if you already write that much documentation, why 
not turn it into kerneldoc? :) But this function is clearly not intended 
to have more than one caller, so ... :)

Acked-by: David Hildenbrand <david@...hat.com>

-- 
Cheers,

David / dhildenb