Re: [PATCH v7 1/8] mm/hmm: move page fault handling out of walk callbacks

[Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@ziepe.ca>]

On Tue, Jul 07, 2026 at 12:46:54PM -0700, Stanislav Kinsburskii wrote:
> hmm_range_fault() currently triggers page faults from inside the page-table
> walk callbacks: hmm_vma_walk_pmd(), hmm_vma_walk_pud(),
> hmm_vma_walk_hugetlb_entry() and the pte-level helper all call
> hmm_vma_fault(), which in turn calls handle_mm_fault() while the walker
> still holds nested locks.  The pte spinlock is dropped explicitly by each
> caller, and the hugetlb path manually drops and retakes
> hugetlb_vma_lock_read around the fault to dodge a deadlock against the walk
> framework's unconditional unlock.
> 
> This layering does not extend cleanly to fault handlers that may release
> mmap_lock (VM_FAULT_RETRY, VM_FAULT_COMPLETED). If the lock is dropped
> while walk_page_range() is mid-traversal, the VMA can be freed before the
> walk framework's matching hugetlb_vma_unlock_read(), turning that unlock
> into a use-after-free.
> 
> Split the responsibilities the way get_user_pages() does. Walk callbacks
> become inspect-only: when they detect a range that needs to be faulted in,
> they record it in struct hmm_vma_walk and return a private sentinel
> (HMM_FAULT_PENDING). The outer loop in hmm_range_fault() then drops out of
> walk_page_range(), invokes a new helper hmm_do_fault() that calls
> handle_mm_fault() with only mmap_lock held, and restarts the walk so the
> now-present entries are collected into hmm_pfns.
> 
> No functional change for existing callers. As a side effect the hugetlb
> callback no longer needs the hugetlb_vma_{un}lock_read dance, and every
> fault-path exit from the callbacks now releases the pte spinlock on a
> single, common path. This refactor is also a precursor for adding an
> unlockable variant of hmm_range_fault() in a follow-up patch.
> 
> Signed-off-by: Stanislav Kinsburskii <skinsburskii@gmail.com>
> ---
>  mm/hmm.c |  118 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-----------------------
>  1 file changed, 75 insertions(+), 43 deletions(-)

Reviewed-by: Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@nvidia.com>

Jason