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1 ==============================
2 UNEVICTABLE LRU INFRASTRUCTURE
3 ==============================
4
5========
6CONTENTS
7========
8
9 (*) The Unevictable LRU
10
11 - The unevictable page list.
12 - Memory control group interaction.
13 - Marking address spaces unevictable.
14 - Detecting Unevictable Pages.
15 - vmscan's handling of unevictable pages.
16
17 (*) mlock()'d pages.
18
19 - History.
20 - Basic management.
21 - mlock()/mlockall() system call handling.
22 - Filtering special vmas.
23 - munlock()/munlockall() system call handling.
24 - Migrating mlocked pages.
25 - mmap(MAP_LOCKED) system call handling.
26 - munmap()/exit()/exec() system call handling.
27 - try_to_unmap().
28 - try_to_munlock() reverse map scan.
29 - Page reclaim in shrink_*_list().
30
31
32============
33INTRODUCTION
34============
35
36This document describes the Linux memory manager's "Unevictable LRU"
37infrastructure and the use of this to manage several types of "unevictable"
38pages.
39
40The document attempts to provide the overall rationale behind this mechanism
41and the rationale for some of the design decisions that drove the
42implementation. The latter design rationale is discussed in the context of an
43implementation description. Admittedly, one can obtain the implementation
44details - the "what does it do?" - by reading the code. One hopes that the
45descriptions below add value by provide the answer to "why does it do that?".
46
47
48===================
49THE UNEVICTABLE LRU
50===================
51
52The Unevictable LRU facility adds an additional LRU list to track unevictable
53pages and to hide these pages from vmscan. This mechanism is based on a patch
54by Larry Woodman of Red Hat to address several scalability problems with page
fa07e787 55reclaim in Linux. The problems have been observed at customer sites on large
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56memory x86_64 systems.
57
58To illustrate this with an example, a non-NUMA x86_64 platform with 128GB of
59main memory will have over 32 million 4k pages in a single zone. When a large
60fraction of these pages are not evictable for any reason [see below], vmscan
61will spend a lot of time scanning the LRU lists looking for the small fraction
62of pages that are evictable. This can result in a situation where all CPUs are
63spending 100% of their time in vmscan for hours or days on end, with the system
64completely unresponsive.
65
66The unevictable list addresses the following classes of unevictable pages:
67
68 (*) Those owned by ramfs.
69
70 (*) Those mapped into SHM_LOCK'd shared memory regions.
71
72 (*) Those mapped into VM_LOCKED [mlock()ed] VMAs.
73
74The infrastructure may also be able to handle other conditions that make pages
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75unevictable, either by definition or by circumstance, in the future.
76
77
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78THE UNEVICTABLE PAGE LIST
79-------------------------
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80
81The Unevictable LRU infrastructure consists of an additional, per-zone, LRU list
82called the "unevictable" list and an associated page flag, PG_unevictable, to
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83indicate that the page is being managed on the unevictable list.
84
85The PG_unevictable flag is analogous to, and mutually exclusive with, the
86PG_active flag in that it indicates on which LRU list a page resides when
87PG_lru is set. The unevictable list is compile-time configurable based on the
88UNEVICTABLE_LRU Kconfig option.
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89
90The Unevictable LRU infrastructure maintains unevictable pages on an additional
91LRU list for a few reasons:
92
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93 (1) We get to "treat unevictable pages just like we treat other pages in the
94 system - which means we get to use the same code to manipulate them, the
95 same code to isolate them (for migrate, etc.), the same code to keep track
96 of the statistics, etc..." [Rik van Riel]
97
98 (2) We want to be able to migrate unevictable pages between nodes for memory
99 defragmentation, workload management and memory hotplug. The linux kernel
100 can only migrate pages that it can successfully isolate from the LRU
101 lists. If we were to maintain pages elsewhere than on an LRU-like list,
102 where they can be found by isolate_lru_page(), we would prevent their
103 migration, unless we reworked migration code to find the unevictable pages
104 itself.
fa07e787 105
fa07e787 106
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107The unevictable list does not differentiate between file-backed and anonymous,
108swap-backed pages. This differentiation is only important while the pages are,
109in fact, evictable.
fa07e787 110
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111The unevictable list benefits from the "arrayification" of the per-zone LRU
112lists and statistics originally proposed and posted by Christoph Lameter.
fa07e787 113
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114The unevictable list does not use the LRU pagevec mechanism. Rather,
115unevictable pages are placed directly on the page's zone's unevictable list
116under the zone lru_lock. This allows us to prevent the stranding of pages on
117the unevictable list when one task has the page isolated from the LRU and other
118tasks are changing the "evictability" state of the page.
fa07e787 119
fa07e787 120
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121MEMORY CONTROL GROUP INTERACTION
122--------------------------------
fa07e787 123
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124The unevictable LRU facility interacts with the memory control group [aka
125memory controller; see Documentation/cgroups/memory.txt] by extending the
126lru_list enum.
127
128The memory controller data structure automatically gets a per-zone unevictable
129list as a result of the "arrayification" of the per-zone LRU lists (one per
130lru_list enum element). The memory controller tracks the movement of pages to
131and from the unevictable list.
fa07e787 132
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133When a memory control group comes under memory pressure, the controller will
134not attempt to reclaim pages on the unevictable list. This has a couple of
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135effects:
136
137 (1) Because the pages are "hidden" from reclaim on the unevictable list, the
138 reclaim process can be more efficient, dealing only with pages that have a
139 chance of being reclaimed.
140
141 (2) On the other hand, if too many of the pages charged to the control group
142 are unevictable, the evictable portion of the working set of the tasks in
143 the control group may not fit into the available memory. This can cause
144 the control group to thrash or to OOM-kill tasks.
145
146
147MARKING ADDRESS SPACES UNEVICTABLE
148----------------------------------
149
150For facilities such as ramfs none of the pages attached to the address space
151may be evicted. To prevent eviction of any such pages, the AS_UNEVICTABLE
152address space flag is provided, and this can be manipulated by a filesystem
153using a number of wrapper functions:
154
155 (*) void mapping_set_unevictable(struct address_space *mapping);
156
157 Mark the address space as being completely unevictable.
158
159 (*) void mapping_clear_unevictable(struct address_space *mapping);
160
161 Mark the address space as being evictable.
162
163 (*) int mapping_unevictable(struct address_space *mapping);
164
165 Query the address space, and return true if it is completely
166 unevictable.
167
168These are currently used in two places in the kernel:
169
170 (1) By ramfs to mark the address spaces of its inodes when they are created,
171 and this mark remains for the life of the inode.
172
173 (2) By SYSV SHM to mark SHM_LOCK'd address spaces until SHM_UNLOCK is called.
174
175 Note that SHM_LOCK is not required to page in the locked pages if they're
176 swapped out; the application must touch the pages manually if it wants to
177 ensure they're in memory.
178
179
180DETECTING UNEVICTABLE PAGES
181---------------------------
182
183The function page_evictable() in vmscan.c determines whether a page is
184evictable or not using the query function outlined above [see section "Marking
185address spaces unevictable"] to check the AS_UNEVICTABLE flag.
186
187For address spaces that are so marked after being populated (as SHM regions
188might be), the lock action (eg: SHM_LOCK) can be lazy, and need not populate
189the page tables for the region as does, for example, mlock(), nor need it make
190any special effort to push any pages in the SHM_LOCK'd area to the unevictable
191list. Instead, vmscan will do this if and when it encounters the pages during
192a reclamation scan.
193
194On an unlock action (such as SHM_UNLOCK), the unlocker (eg: shmctl()) must scan
195the pages in the region and "rescue" them from the unevictable list if no other
196condition is keeping them unevictable. If an unevictable region is destroyed,
197the pages are also "rescued" from the unevictable list in the process of
198freeing them.
199
200page_evictable() also checks for mlocked pages by testing an additional page
201flag, PG_mlocked (as wrapped by PageMlocked()). If the page is NOT mlocked,
202and a non-NULL VMA is supplied, page_evictable() will check whether the VMA is
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203VM_LOCKED via is_mlocked_vma(). is_mlocked_vma() will SetPageMlocked() and
204update the appropriate statistics if the vma is VM_LOCKED. This method allows
205efficient "culling" of pages in the fault path that are being faulted in to
c24b7201 206VM_LOCKED VMAs.
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207
208
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209VMSCAN'S HANDLING OF UNEVICTABLE PAGES
210--------------------------------------
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211
212If unevictable pages are culled in the fault path, or moved to the unevictable
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213list at mlock() or mmap() time, vmscan will not encounter the pages until they
214have become evictable again (via munlock() for example) and have been "rescued"
215from the unevictable list. However, there may be situations where we decide,
216for the sake of expediency, to leave a unevictable page on one of the regular
217active/inactive LRU lists for vmscan to deal with. vmscan checks for such
218pages in all of the shrink_{active|inactive|page}_list() functions and will
219"cull" such pages that it encounters: that is, it diverts those pages to the
220unevictable list for the zone being scanned.
221
222There may be situations where a page is mapped into a VM_LOCKED VMA, but the
223page is not marked as PG_mlocked. Such pages will make it all the way to
fa07e787 224shrink_page_list() where they will be detected when vmscan walks the reverse
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225map in try_to_unmap(). If try_to_unmap() returns SWAP_MLOCK,
226shrink_page_list() will cull the page at that point.
fa07e787 227
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228To "cull" an unevictable page, vmscan simply puts the page back on the LRU list
229using putback_lru_page() - the inverse operation to isolate_lru_page() - after
230dropping the page lock. Because the condition which makes the page unevictable
231may change once the page is unlocked, putback_lru_page() will recheck the
232unevictable state of a page that it places on the unevictable list. If the
233page has become unevictable, putback_lru_page() removes it from the list and
234retries, including the page_unevictable() test. Because such a race is a rare
235event and movement of pages onto the unevictable list should be rare, these
236extra evictabilty checks should not occur in the majority of calls to
237putback_lru_page().
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238
239
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240=============
241MLOCKED PAGES
242=============
fa07e787 243
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244The unevictable page list is also useful for mlock(), in addition to ramfs and
245SYSV SHM. Note that mlock() is only available in CONFIG_MMU=y situations; in
246NOMMU situations, all mappings are effectively mlocked.
247
248
249HISTORY
250-------
251
252The "Unevictable mlocked Pages" infrastructure is based on work originally
fa07e787 253posted by Nick Piggin in an RFC patch entitled "mm: mlocked pages off LRU".
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254Nick posted his patch as an alternative to a patch posted by Christoph Lameter
255to achieve the same objective: hiding mlocked pages from vmscan.
256
257In Nick's patch, he used one of the struct page LRU list link fields as a count
258of VM_LOCKED VMAs that map the page. This use of the link field for a count
259prevented the management of the pages on an LRU list, and thus mlocked pages
260were not migratable as isolate_lru_page() could not find them, and the LRU list
261link field was not available to the migration subsystem.
262
263Nick resolved this by putting mlocked pages back on the lru list before
264attempting to isolate them, thus abandoning the count of VM_LOCKED VMAs. When
265Nick's patch was integrated with the Unevictable LRU work, the count was
266replaced by walking the reverse map to determine whether any VM_LOCKED VMAs
267mapped the page. More on this below.
268
269
270BASIC MANAGEMENT
271----------------
272
273mlocked pages - pages mapped into a VM_LOCKED VMA - are a class of unevictable
274pages. When such a page has been "noticed" by the memory management subsystem,
275the page is marked with the PG_mlocked flag. This can be manipulated using the
276PageMlocked() functions.
277
278A PG_mlocked page will be placed on the unevictable list when it is added to
279the LRU. Such pages can be "noticed" by memory management in several places:
280
281 (1) in the mlock()/mlockall() system call handlers;
282
283 (2) in the mmap() system call handler when mmapping a region with the
284 MAP_LOCKED flag;
285
286 (3) mmapping a region in a task that has called mlockall() with the MCL_FUTURE
287 flag
288
289 (4) in the fault path, if mlocked pages are "culled" in the fault path,
290 and when a VM_LOCKED stack segment is expanded; or
291
292 (5) as mentioned above, in vmscan:shrink_page_list() when attempting to
293 reclaim a page in a VM_LOCKED VMA via try_to_unmap()
294
295all of which result in the VM_LOCKED flag being set for the VMA if it doesn't
296already have it set.
297
298mlocked pages become unlocked and rescued from the unevictable list when:
299
300 (1) mapped in a range unlocked via the munlock()/munlockall() system calls;
301
302 (2) munmap()'d out of the last VM_LOCKED VMA that maps the page, including
303 unmapping at task exit;
304
305 (3) when the page is truncated from the last VM_LOCKED VMA of an mmapped file;
306 or
307
308 (4) before a page is COW'd in a VM_LOCKED VMA.
309
310
311mlock()/mlockall() SYSTEM CALL HANDLING
312---------------------------------------
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313
314Both [do_]mlock() and [do_]mlockall() system call handlers call mlock_fixup()
c24b7201 315for each VMA in the range specified by the call. In the case of mlockall(),
fa07e787 316this is the entire active address space of the task. Note that mlock_fixup()
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317is used for both mlocking and munlocking a range of memory. A call to mlock()
318an already VM_LOCKED VMA, or to munlock() a VMA that is not VM_LOCKED is
319treated as a no-op, and mlock_fixup() simply returns.
320
321If the VMA passes some filtering as described in "Filtering Special Vmas"
322below, mlock_fixup() will attempt to merge the VMA with its neighbors or split
323off a subset of the VMA if the range does not cover the entire VMA. Once the
324VMA has been merged or split or neither, mlock_fixup() will call
325__mlock_vma_pages_range() to fault in the pages via get_user_pages() and to
326mark the pages as mlocked via mlock_vma_page().
327
328Note that the VMA being mlocked might be mapped with PROT_NONE. In this case,
329get_user_pages() will be unable to fault in the pages. That's okay. If pages
330do end up getting faulted into this VM_LOCKED VMA, we'll handle them in the
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331fault path or in vmscan.
332
333Also note that a page returned by get_user_pages() could be truncated or
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334migrated out from under us, while we're trying to mlock it. To detect this,
335__mlock_vma_pages_range() checks page_mapping() after acquiring the page lock.
336If the page is still associated with its mapping, we'll go ahead and call
337mlock_vma_page(). If the mapping is gone, we just unlock the page and move on.
338In the worst case, this will result in a page mapped in a VM_LOCKED VMA
339remaining on a normal LRU list without being PageMlocked(). Again, vmscan will
340detect and cull such pages.
341
342mlock_vma_page() will call TestSetPageMlocked() for each page returned by
343get_user_pages(). We use TestSetPageMlocked() because the page might already
344be mlocked by another task/VMA and we don't want to do extra work. We
345especially do not want to count an mlocked page more than once in the
346statistics. If the page was already mlocked, mlock_vma_page() need do nothing
347more.
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348
349If the page was NOT already mlocked, mlock_vma_page() attempts to isolate the
350page from the LRU, as it is likely on the appropriate active or inactive list
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351at that time. If the isolate_lru_page() succeeds, mlock_vma_page() will put
352back the page - by calling putback_lru_page() - which will notice that the page
353is now mlocked and divert the page to the zone's unevictable list. If
fa07e787 354mlock_vma_page() is unable to isolate the page from the LRU, vmscan will handle
c24b7201 355it later if and when it attempts to reclaim the page.
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356
357
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358FILTERING SPECIAL VMAS
359----------------------
fa07e787 360
c24b7201 361mlock_fixup() filters several classes of "special" VMAs:
fa07e787 362
c24b7201 3631) VMAs with VM_IO or VM_PFNMAP set are skipped entirely. The pages behind
fa07e787 364 these mappings are inherently pinned, so we don't need to mark them as
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365 mlocked. In any case, most of the pages have no struct page in which to so
366 mark the page. Because of this, get_user_pages() will fail for these VMAs,
367 so there is no sense in attempting to visit them.
368
3692) VMAs mapping hugetlbfs page are already effectively pinned into memory. We
370 neither need nor want to mlock() these pages. However, to preserve the
371 prior behavior of mlock() - before the unevictable/mlock changes -
372 mlock_fixup() will call make_pages_present() in the hugetlbfs VMA range to
373 allocate the huge pages and populate the ptes.
374
3753) VMAs with VM_DONTEXPAND or VM_RESERVED are generally userspace mappings of
376 kernel pages, such as the VDSO page, relay channel pages, etc. These pages
fa07e787 377 are inherently unevictable and are not managed on the LRU lists.
c24b7201 378 mlock_fixup() treats these VMAs the same as hugetlbfs VMAs. It calls
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379 make_pages_present() to populate the ptes.
380
c24b7201 381Note that for all of these special VMAs, mlock_fixup() does not set the
fa07e787 382VM_LOCKED flag. Therefore, we won't have to deal with them later during
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383munlock(), munmap() or task exit. Neither does mlock_fixup() account these
384VMAs against the task's "locked_vm".
385
386
387munlock()/munlockall() SYSTEM CALL HANDLING
388-------------------------------------------
389
390The munlock() and munlockall() system calls are handled by the same functions -
391do_mlock[all]() - as the mlock() and mlockall() system calls with the unlock vs
392lock operation indicated by an argument. So, these system calls are also
393handled by mlock_fixup(). Again, if called for an already munlocked VMA,
394mlock_fixup() simply returns. Because of the VMA filtering discussed above,
395VM_LOCKED will not be set in any "special" VMAs. So, these VMAs will be
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396ignored for munlock.
397
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398If the VMA is VM_LOCKED, mlock_fixup() again attempts to merge or split off the
399specified range. The range is then munlocked via the function
400__mlock_vma_pages_range() - the same function used to mlock a VMA range -
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401passing a flag to indicate that munlock() is being performed.
402
c24b7201 403Because the VMA access protections could have been changed to PROT_NONE after
63d6c5ad 404faulting in and mlocking pages, get_user_pages() was unreliable for visiting
c24b7201 405these pages for munlocking. Because we don't want to leave pages mlocked,
fa07e787 406get_user_pages() was enhanced to accept a flag to ignore the permissions when
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407fetching the pages - all of which should be resident as a result of previous
408mlocking.
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409
410For munlock(), __mlock_vma_pages_range() unlocks individual pages by calling
411munlock_vma_page(). munlock_vma_page() unconditionally clears the PG_mlocked
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412flag using TestClearPageMlocked(). As with mlock_vma_page(),
413munlock_vma_page() use the Test*PageMlocked() function to handle the case where
414the page might have already been unlocked by another task. If the page was
415mlocked, munlock_vma_page() updates that zone statistics for the number of
416mlocked pages. Note, however, that at this point we haven't checked whether
417the page is mapped by other VM_LOCKED VMAs.
418
419We can't call try_to_munlock(), the function that walks the reverse map to
420check for other VM_LOCKED VMAs, without first isolating the page from the LRU.
fa07e787 421try_to_munlock() is a variant of try_to_unmap() and thus requires that the page
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422not be on an LRU list [more on these below]. However, the call to
423isolate_lru_page() could fail, in which case we couldn't try_to_munlock(). So,
424we go ahead and clear PG_mlocked up front, as this might be the only chance we
425have. If we can successfully isolate the page, we go ahead and
fa07e787 426try_to_munlock(), which will restore the PG_mlocked flag and update the zone
c24b7201 427page statistics if it finds another VMA holding the page mlocked. If we fail
fa07e787 428to isolate the page, we'll have left a potentially mlocked page on the LRU.
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429This is fine, because we'll catch it later if and if vmscan tries to reclaim
430the page. This should be relatively rare.
431
432
433MIGRATING MLOCKED PAGES
434-----------------------
435
436A page that is being migrated has been isolated from the LRU lists and is held
437locked across unmapping of the page, updating the page's address space entry
438and copying the contents and state, until the page table entry has been
439replaced with an entry that refers to the new page. Linux supports migration
440of mlocked pages and other unevictable pages. This involves simply moving the
441PG_mlocked and PG_unevictable states from the old page to the new page.
442
443Note that page migration can race with mlocking or munlocking of the same page.
444This has been discussed from the mlock/munlock perspective in the respective
445sections above. Both processes (migration and m[un]locking) hold the page
446locked. This provides the first level of synchronization. Page migration
447zeros out the page_mapping of the old page before unlocking it, so m[un]lock
448can skip these pages by testing the page mapping under page lock.
449
450To complete page migration, we place the new and old pages back onto the LRU
451after dropping the page lock. The "unneeded" page - old page on success, new
452page on failure - will be freed when the reference count held by the migration
453process is released. To ensure that we don't strand pages on the unevictable
454list because of a race between munlock and migration, page migration uses the
455putback_lru_page() function to add migrated pages back to the LRU.
456
457
458mmap(MAP_LOCKED) SYSTEM CALL HANDLING
459-------------------------------------
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460
461In addition the the mlock()/mlockall() system calls, an application can request
c24b7201 462that a region of memory be mlocked supplying the MAP_LOCKED flag to the mmap()
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463call. Furthermore, any mmap() call or brk() call that expands the heap by a
464task that has previously called mlockall() with the MCL_FUTURE flag will result
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465in the newly mapped memory being mlocked. Before the unevictable/mlock
466changes, the kernel simply called make_pages_present() to allocate pages and
467populate the page table.
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468
469To mlock a range of memory under the unevictable/mlock infrastructure, the
470mmap() handler and task address space expansion functions call
471mlock_vma_pages_range() specifying the vma and the address range to mlock.
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472mlock_vma_pages_range() filters VMAs like mlock_fixup(), as described above in
473"Filtering Special VMAs". It will clear the VM_LOCKED flag, which will have
474already been set by the caller, in filtered VMAs. Thus these VMA's need not be
475visited for munlock when the region is unmapped.
fa07e787 476
c24b7201 477For "normal" VMAs, mlock_vma_pages_range() calls __mlock_vma_pages_range() to
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478fault/allocate the pages and mlock them. Again, like mlock_fixup(),
479mlock_vma_pages_range() downgrades the mmap semaphore to read mode before
c24b7201 480attempting to fault/allocate and mlock the pages and "upgrades" the semaphore
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481back to write mode before returning.
482
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483The callers of mlock_vma_pages_range() will have already added the memory range
484to be mlocked to the task's "locked_vm". To account for filtered VMAs,
fa07e787 485mlock_vma_pages_range() returns the number of pages NOT mlocked. All of the
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486callers then subtract a non-negative return value from the task's locked_vm. A
487negative return value represent an error - for example, from get_user_pages()
488attempting to fault in a VMA with PROT_NONE access. In this case, we leave the
489memory range accounted as locked_vm, as the protections could be changed later
490and pages allocated into that region.
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491
492
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493munmap()/exit()/exec() SYSTEM CALL HANDLING
494-------------------------------------------
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495
496When unmapping an mlocked region of memory, whether by an explicit call to
497munmap() or via an internal unmap from exit() or exec() processing, we must
c24b7201 498munlock the pages if we're removing the last VM_LOCKED VMA that maps the pages.
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499Before the unevictable/mlock changes, mlocking did not mark the pages in any
500way, so unmapping them required no processing.
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501
502To munlock a range of memory under the unevictable/mlock infrastructure, the
c24b7201 503munmap() handler and task address space call tear down function
fa07e787 504munlock_vma_pages_all(). The name reflects the observation that one always
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505specifies the entire VMA range when munlock()ing during unmap of a region.
506Because of the VMA filtering when mlocking() regions, only "normal" VMAs that
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507actually contain mlocked pages will be passed to munlock_vma_pages_all().
508
c24b7201 509munlock_vma_pages_all() clears the VM_LOCKED VMA flag and, like mlock_fixup()
fa07e787 510for the munlock case, calls __munlock_vma_pages_range() to walk the page table
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511for the VMA's memory range and munlock_vma_page() each resident page mapped by
512the VMA. This effectively munlocks the page, only if this is the last
513VM_LOCKED VMA that maps the page.
fa07e787 514
fa07e787 515
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516try_to_unmap()
517--------------
fa07e787 518
c24b7201 519Pages can, of course, be mapped into multiple VMAs. Some of these VMAs may
fa07e787 520have VM_LOCKED flag set. It is possible for a page mapped into one or more
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521VM_LOCKED VMAs not to have the PG_mlocked flag set and therefore reside on one
522of the active or inactive LRU lists. This could happen if, for example, a task
523in the process of munlocking the page could not isolate the page from the LRU.
524As a result, vmscan/shrink_page_list() might encounter such a page as described
525in section "vmscan's handling of unevictable pages". To handle this situation,
526try_to_unmap() checks for VM_LOCKED VMAs while it is walking a page's reverse
527map.
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528
529try_to_unmap() is always called, by either vmscan for reclaim or for page
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530migration, with the argument page locked and isolated from the LRU. Separate
531functions handle anonymous and mapped file pages, as these types of pages have
532different reverse map mechanisms.
533
534 (*) try_to_unmap_anon()
535
536 To unmap anonymous pages, each VMA in the list anchored in the anon_vma
537 must be visited - at least until a VM_LOCKED VMA is encountered. If the
538 page is being unmapped for migration, VM_LOCKED VMAs do not stop the
539 process because mlocked pages are migratable. However, for reclaim, if
540 the page is mapped into a VM_LOCKED VMA, the scan stops.
541
542 try_to_unmap_anon() attempts to acquire in read mode the mmap semphore of
543 the mm_struct to which the VMA belongs. If this is successful, it will
544 mlock the page via mlock_vma_page() - we wouldn't have gotten to
545 try_to_unmap_anon() if the page were already mlocked - and will return
546 SWAP_MLOCK, indicating that the page is unevictable.
547
548 If the mmap semaphore cannot be acquired, we are not sure whether the page
549 is really unevictable or not. In this case, try_to_unmap_anon() will
550 return SWAP_AGAIN.
551
552 (*) try_to_unmap_file() - linear mappings
553
554 Unmapping of a mapped file page works the same as for anonymous mappings,
555 except that the scan visits all VMAs that map the page's index/page offset
556 in the page's mapping's reverse map priority search tree. It also visits
557 each VMA in the page's mapping's non-linear list, if the list is
558 non-empty.
559
560 As for anonymous pages, on encountering a VM_LOCKED VMA for a mapped file
561 page, try_to_unmap_file() will attempt to acquire the associated
562 mm_struct's mmap semaphore to mlock the page, returning SWAP_MLOCK if this
563 is successful, and SWAP_AGAIN, if not.
564
565 (*) try_to_unmap_file() - non-linear mappings
566
567 If a page's mapping contains a non-empty non-linear mapping VMA list, then
568 try_to_un{map|lock}() must also visit each VMA in that list to determine
569 whether the page is mapped in a VM_LOCKED VMA. Again, the scan must visit
570 all VMAs in the non-linear list to ensure that the pages is not/should not
571 be mlocked.
572
573 If a VM_LOCKED VMA is found in the list, the scan could terminate.
574 However, there is no easy way to determine whether the page is actually
575 mapped in a given VMA - either for unmapping or testing whether the
576 VM_LOCKED VMA actually pins the page.
577
578 try_to_unmap_file() handles non-linear mappings by scanning a certain
579 number of pages - a "cluster" - in each non-linear VMA associated with the
580 page's mapping, for each file mapped page that vmscan tries to unmap. If
581 this happens to unmap the page we're trying to unmap, try_to_unmap() will
582 notice this on return (page_mapcount(page) will be 0) and return
583 SWAP_SUCCESS. Otherwise, it will return SWAP_AGAIN, causing vmscan to
584 recirculate this page. We take advantage of the cluster scan in
585 try_to_unmap_cluster() as follows:
586
587 For each non-linear VMA, try_to_unmap_cluster() attempts to acquire the
588 mmap semaphore of the associated mm_struct for read without blocking.
589
590 If this attempt is successful and the VMA is VM_LOCKED,
591 try_to_unmap_cluster() will retain the mmap semaphore for the scan;
592 otherwise it drops it here.
593
594 Then, for each page in the cluster, if we're holding the mmap semaphore
595 for a locked VMA, try_to_unmap_cluster() calls mlock_vma_page() to
596 mlock the page. This call is a no-op if the page is already locked,
597 but will mlock any pages in the non-linear mapping that happen to be
598 unlocked.
599
600 If one of the pages so mlocked is the page passed in to try_to_unmap(),
601 try_to_unmap_cluster() will return SWAP_MLOCK, rather than the default
602 SWAP_AGAIN. This will allow vmscan to cull the page, rather than
603 recirculating it on the inactive list.
604
605 Again, if try_to_unmap_cluster() cannot acquire the VMA's mmap sem, it
606 returns SWAP_AGAIN, indicating that the page is mapped by a VM_LOCKED
607 VMA, but couldn't be mlocked.
608
609
610try_to_munlock() REVERSE MAP SCAN
611---------------------------------
612
613 [!] TODO/FIXME: a better name might be page_mlocked() - analogous to the
614 page_referenced() reverse map walker.
615
616When munlock_vma_page() [see section "munlock()/munlockall() System Call
617Handling" above] tries to munlock a page, it needs to determine whether or not
618the page is mapped by any VM_LOCKED VMA without actually attempting to unmap
619all PTEs from the page. For this purpose, the unevictable/mlock infrastructure
620introduced a variant of try_to_unmap() called try_to_munlock().
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621
622try_to_munlock() calls the same functions as try_to_unmap() for anonymous and
623mapped file pages with an additional argument specifing unlock versus unmap
624processing. Again, these functions walk the respective reverse maps looking
c24b7201 625for VM_LOCKED VMAs. When such a VMA is found for anonymous pages and file
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626pages mapped in linear VMAs, as in the try_to_unmap() case, the functions
627attempt to acquire the associated mmap semphore, mlock the page via
628mlock_vma_page() and return SWAP_MLOCK. This effectively undoes the
63d6c5ad 629pre-clearing of the page's PG_mlocked done by munlock_vma_page.
fa07e787 630
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631If try_to_unmap() is unable to acquire a VM_LOCKED VMA's associated mmap
632semaphore, it will return SWAP_AGAIN. This will allow shrink_page_list() to
633recycle the page on the inactive list and hope that it has better luck with the
634page next time.
635
636For file pages mapped into non-linear VMAs, the try_to_munlock() logic works
637slightly differently. On encountering a VM_LOCKED non-linear VMA that might
638map the page, try_to_munlock() returns SWAP_AGAIN without actually mlocking the
639page. munlock_vma_page() will just leave the page unlocked and let vmscan deal
640with it - the usual fallback position.
641
642Note that try_to_munlock()'s reverse map walk must visit every VMA in a page's
643reverse map to determine that a page is NOT mapped into any VM_LOCKED VMA.
644However, the scan can terminate when it encounters a VM_LOCKED VMA and can
645successfully acquire the VMA's mmap semphore for read and mlock the page.
646Although try_to_munlock() might be called a great many times when munlocking a
647large region or tearing down a large address space that has been mlocked via
648mlockall(), overall this is a fairly rare event.
649
650
651PAGE RECLAIM IN shrink_*_list()
652-------------------------------
653
654shrink_active_list() culls any obviously unevictable pages - i.e.
655!page_evictable(page, NULL) - diverting these to the unevictable list.
656However, shrink_active_list() only sees unevictable pages that made it onto the
657active/inactive lru lists. Note that these pages do not have PageUnevictable
658set - otherwise they would be on the unevictable list and shrink_active_list
659would never see them.
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660
661Some examples of these unevictable pages on the LRU lists are:
662
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663 (1) ramfs pages that have been placed on the LRU lists when first allocated.
664
665 (2) SHM_LOCK'd shared memory pages. shmctl(SHM_LOCK) does not attempt to
666 allocate or fault in the pages in the shared memory region. This happens
667 when an application accesses the page the first time after SHM_LOCK'ing
668 the segment.
fa07e787 669
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670 (3) mlocked pages that could not be isolated from the LRU and moved to the
671 unevictable list in mlock_vma_page().
fa07e787 672
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673 (4) Pages mapped into multiple VM_LOCKED VMAs, but try_to_munlock() couldn't
674 acquire the VMA's mmap semaphore to test the flags and set PageMlocked.
675 munlock_vma_page() was forced to let the page back on to the normal LRU
676 list for vmscan to handle.
fa07e787 677
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678shrink_inactive_list() also diverts any unevictable pages that it finds on the
679inactive lists to the appropriate zone's unevictable list.
fa07e787 680
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681shrink_inactive_list() should only see SHM_LOCK'd pages that became SHM_LOCK'd
682after shrink_active_list() had moved them to the inactive list, or pages mapped
683into VM_LOCKED VMAs that munlock_vma_page() couldn't isolate from the LRU to
684recheck via try_to_munlock(). shrink_inactive_list() won't notice the latter,
685but will pass on to shrink_page_list().
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686
687shrink_page_list() again culls obviously unevictable pages that it could
63d6c5ad 688encounter for similar reason to shrink_inactive_list(). Pages mapped into
c24b7201 689VM_LOCKED VMAs but without PG_mlocked set will make it all the way to
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690try_to_unmap(). shrink_page_list() will divert them to the unevictable list
691when try_to_unmap() returns SWAP_MLOCK, as discussed above.