linux-kernel - Re: [RFC 0/3] cgroups: Add support for pinned device memory

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Message-ID: <776629b2-5459-4fa0-803e-23d4824e7b24@redhat.com>
Date: Mon, 1 Sep 2025 20:38:37 +0200
From: David Hildenbrand <david@...hat.com>
To: Thomas Hellström <thomas.hellstrom@...ux.intel.com>,
 Maarten Lankhorst <dev@...khorst.se>,
 Lucas De Marchi <lucas.demarchi@...el.com>,
 Rodrigo Vivi <rodrigo.vivi@...el.com>, David Airlie <airlied@...il.com>,
 Simona Vetter <simona@...ll.ch>, Maxime Ripard <mripard@...nel.org>,
 Natalie Vock <natalie.vock@....de>, Tejun Heo <tj@...nel.org>,
 Johannes Weiner <hannes@...xchg.org>, 'Michal Koutný'
 <mkoutny@...e.com>, Michal Hocko <mhocko@...nel.org>,
 Roman Gushchin <roman.gushchin@...ux.dev>,
 Shakeel Butt <shakeel.butt@...ux.dev>, Muchun Song <muchun.song@...ux.dev>,
 Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
 Lorenzo Stoakes <lorenzo.stoakes@...cle.com>,
 "'Liam R . Howlett'" <Liam.Howlett@...cle.com>,
 Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@...e.cz>, Mike Rapoport <rppt@...nel.org>,
 Suren Baghdasaryan <surenb@...gle.com>,
 Thomas Zimmermann <tzimmermann@...e.de>
Cc: Michal Hocko <mhocko@...e.com>, intel-xe@...ts.freedesktop.org,
 dri-devel@...ts.freedesktop.org, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
 cgroups@...r.kernel.org, linux-mm@...ck.org
Subject: Re: [RFC 0/3] cgroups: Add support for pinned device memory

On 01.09.25 20:21, Thomas Hellström wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On Mon, 2025-09-01 at 20:16 +0200, Maarten Lankhorst wrote:
>> Hello David,
>>
>> Den 2025-09-01 kl. 14:25, skrev David Hildenbrand:
>>> On 19.08.25 13:49, Maarten Lankhorst wrote:
>>>> When exporting dma-bufs to other devices, even when it is allowed
>>>> to use
>>>> move_notify in some drivers, performance will degrade severely
>>>> when
>>>> eviction happens.
>>>>
>>>> A perticular example where this can happen is in a multi-card
>>>> setup,
>>>> where PCI-E peer-to-peer is used to prevent using access to
>>>> system memory.
>>>>
>>>> If the buffer is evicted to system memory, not only the evicting
>>>> GPU wher
>>>> the buffer resided is affected, but it will also stall the GPU
>>>> that is
>>>> waiting on the buffer.
>>>>
>>>> It also makes sense for long running jobs not to be preempted by
>>>> having
>>>> its buffers evicted, so it will make sense to have the ability to
>>>> pin
>>>> from system memory too.
>>>>
>>>> This is dependant on patches by Dave Airlie, so it's not part of
>>>> this
>>>> series yet. But I'm planning on extending pinning to the memory
>>>> cgroup
>>>> controller in the future to handle this case.
>>>>
>>>> Implementation details:
>>>>
>>>> For each cgroup up until the root cgroup, the 'min' limit is
>>>> checked
>>>> against currently effectively pinned value. If the value will go
>>>> above
>>>> 'min', the pinning attempt is rejected.
>>>>
>>>> Pinned memory is handled slightly different and affects
>>>> calculating
>>>> effective min/low values. Pinned memory is subtracted from both,
>>>> and needs to be added afterwards when calculating.
>>>
>>> The term "pinning" is overloaded, and frequently we refer to
>>> pin_user_pages() and friends.
>>>
>>> So I'm wondering if there is an alternative term to describe what
>>> you want to achieve.
>>>
>>> Is it something like "unevictable" ?
>> It could be required to include a call pin_user_pages(), in case a

We'll only care about long-term pinnings (i.e., FOLL_LONGTERM). Ordinary 
short-term pinning is just fine.

(see how even "pinning" is overloaded? :) )

>> process wants to pin
>> from a user's address space to the gpu.
>>
>> It's not done yet, but it wouldn't surprise me if we want to include
>> it in the future.
>> Functionally it's similar to mlock() and related functions.

Traditionally, vfio, io_uring and rdma do exactly that: they use GUP to 
longterm pin and then account that memory towards RLIMIT_MEMLOCK.

If you grep for "rlimit(RLIMIT_MEMLOCK)", you'll see what I mean.

There are known issues with that: imagine long-term pinning the same 
folio through GUP with 2 interfaces (e.g., vfio, io_uring, rdma), or 
within the same interface.

You'd account the memory multiple times, which is horrible. And so far 
there is no easy way out.

>>
>> Perhaps call it mlocked instead?
> 
> I was under the impression that mlocked() memory can be migrated to
> other physical memory but not to swap? whereas pinned memory needs to
> remain the exact same physical memory.

Yes, exactly.

> 
> IMO "pinned" is pretty established within GPU drivers (dma-buf, TTM)
> and essentially means the same as "pin" in "pin_user_pages", so
> inventing a new name would probably cause even more confusion?

If it's the same thing, absolutely. But Marteen said "It's not done yet, 
but it wouldn't surprise me if we want to include it in the future".

So how is the memory we are talking about in this series "pinned" ?

-- 
Cheers

David / dhildenb