Message-ID: <f5c4c443f8ba855d329a180a6816fc259eb8dfca@linux.dev>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2025 02:46:31 +0000
From: hui.zhu@...ux.dev
To: "Michal Hocko" <mhocko@...e.com>
Cc: "Roman Gushchin" <roman.gushchin@...ux.dev>, "Andrew Morton"
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 linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, linux-mm@...ck.org,
 cgroups@...r.kernel.org, bpf@...r.kernel.org,
 linux-kselftest@...r.kernel.org, "Hui Zhu" <zhuhui@...inos.cn>
Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH 0/3] Memory Controller eBPF support

2025年11月21日 03:20, "Michal Hocko" <mhocko@...e.com mailto:mhocko@...e.com?to=%22Michal%20Hocko%22%20%3Cmhocko%40suse.com%3E > 写到:


> 
> On Thu 20-11-25 09:29:52, hui.zhu@...ux.dev wrote:
> [...]
> 
> > 
> > I generally agree with an idea to use BPF for various memcg-related
> >  policies, but I'm not sure how specific callbacks can be used in
> >  practice.
> >  
> >  Hi Roman,
> >  
> >  Following are some ideas that can use ebpf memcg:
> >  
> >  Priority‑Based Reclaim and Limits in Multi‑Tenant Environments:
> >  On a single machine with multiple tenants / namespaces / containers,
> >  under memory pressure it’s hard to decide “who should be squeezed first”
> >  with static policies baked into the kernel.
> >  Assign a BPF profile to each tenant’s memcg:
> >  Under high global pressure, BPF can decide:
> >  Which memcgs’ memory.high should be raised (delaying reclaim),
> >  Which memcgs should be scanned and reclaimed more aggressively.
> >  
> >  Online Profiling / Diagnosing Memory Hotspots:
> >  A cgroup’s memory keeps growing, but without patching the kernel it’s
> >  difficult to obtain fine‑grained information.
> >  Attach BPF to the memcg charge/uncharge path:
> >  Record large allocations (greater than N KB) with call stacks and
> >  owning file/module, and send them to user space via a BPF ring buffer.
> >  Based on sampled data, generate:
> >  “Top N memory allocation stacks in this container over the last 10 minutes,”
> >  Reports of which objects / call paths are growing fastest.
> >  This makes it possible to pinpoint the root cause of host memory
> >  anomalies without changing application code, which is very useful
> >  in operations/ops scenarios.
> >  
> >  SLO‑Driven Auto Throttling / Scale‑In/Out Signals:
> >  Use eBPF to observe memory usage slope, frequent reclaim,
> >  or near‑OOM behavior within a memcg.
> >  When it decides “OOM is imminent,” instead of just killing/raising
> >  limits, it can emit a signal to a control‑plane component.
> >  For example, send an event to a user‑space agent to trigger
> >  automatic scaling, QPS adjustment, or throttling.
> >  
> >  Prevent a cgroup from launching a large‑scale fork+malloc attack:
> >  BPF checks per‑uid or per‑cgroup allocation behavior over the
> >  last few seconds during memcg charge.
> > 
> AFAIU, these are just very high level ideas rather than anything you are
> trying to target with this patch series, right?
> 
> All I can see is that you add a reclaim hook but it is not really clear
> to me how feasible it is to actually implement a real memory reclaim
> strategy this way.
> 
> In prinicipal I am not really opposed but the memory reclaim process is
> rather involved process and I would really like to see there is
> something real to be done without exporting all the MM code to BPF for
> any practical use. Is there any POC out there?

Hi Michal,

I apologize for not delivering a more substantial POC.

I was hesitant to add extensive eBPF support to memcg
because I wasn't certain it aligned with the community's
vision—and such support would require introducing many
eBPF hooks into memcg.

I will add more eBPF hook to memcg and provide a more
meaningful POC in the next version.

Best,
Hui


> -- 
> Michal Hocko
> SUSE Labs
>

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