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From: Saul Freedman <fre3dm4n@gmail.com>
To: qemu-devel@nongnu.org
Cc: pbonzini@redhat.com, mtosatti@redhat.com, kvm@vger.kernel.org,
	Saul Freedman <fre3dm4n@gmail.com>
Subject: [PATCH RFC 0/1] Fix ICEBP handling after KVM debug exits
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 2026 06:13:54 +0000	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260820061355.196465-1-fre3dm4n@gmail.com> (raw)

To: qemu-devel@nongnu.org
Cc: Paolo Bonzini <pbonzini@redhat.com>,
    Marcelo Tosatti <mtosatti@redhat.com>,
    kvm@vger.kernel.org

KVM normally recognizes ICEBP, advances RIP, and injects #DB itself.
When userspace enables hardware breakpoints, however, KVM reports the
pre-skip #DB through KVM_EXIT_DEBUG.  QEMU currently reinjects it at the
old RIP, causing a debug-exit livelock.

The patch is marked RFC because KVM_EXIT_DEBUG does not preserve KVM's
exact ICEBP classification.  The proposed compatibility heuristic accepts
a causeless #DB whose instruction stream consists only of prefixes and
0xf1.  A durable long-term ABI might instead let KVM expose its exact
classification or advance the instruction before exiting; I would like
feedback from both QEMU and KVM reviewers on that direction.

Validation on an Intel VT-x host:

- Built x86_64-softmmu from current master (ae4f3443209).
- checkpatch reports zero errors and warnings.
- Ran a real Linux guest that executes kernel-mode ICEBP while an
  unrelated hardware breakpoint is installed through QEMU's GDB stub.
  Unpatched QEMU stalls after ICEBP_KERNEL_BEFORE; patched QEMU reaches
  ICEBP_KERNEL_AFTER.

I did not include the hardware reproduction in the patch because it needs
real VT-x, a matching guest kernel build, and a loadable module.  I can
turn the fixture into an optional avocado test if reviewers prefer.

Saul Freedman (1):
  target/i386: skip ICEBP before reinjecting #DB

 target/i386/kvm/kvm.c | 62 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-
 1 file changed, 61 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

-- 
2.55.0

             reply	other threads:[~2026-08-20  6:14 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 2+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2026-08-20  6:13 Saul Freedman [this message]
2026-08-20  6:13 ` [PATCH RFC 1/1] target/i386: skip ICEBP before reinjecting #DB Saul Freedman

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