Re: [PATCH v3] mm: shmem: always support large folios for internal shmem mount

David Hildenbrand (Arm)
2026-04-17T09:52:44Z

On 4/17/26 11:27, Baolin Wang wrote:
>
>
> On 4/17/26 5:21 PM, David Hildenbrand (Arm) wrote:
>> On 4/17/26 05:25, Baolin Wang wrote:
>>> Currently, when shmem mounts are initialized, they only use 'sbinfo-
>>> >huge' to
>>> determine whether the shmem mount supports large folios. However, for
>>> anonymous
>>> shmem, whether it supports large folios can be dynamically configured
>>> via sysfs
>>> interfaces, so setting or not setting mapping_set_large_folios()
>>> during initialization
>>> cannot accurately reflect whether anonymous shmem actually supports
>>> large folios,
>>> which has already caused some confusion[1].
>>>
>>> As discussed with David[2], for anonymous shmem we can treat it as
>>> always potentially
>>> having large folios. Therefore, always support large folios for the
>>> internal shmem
>>> mount (e.g., anonymous shmem), and which large order allocations are
>>> allowed can be
>>> configured dynamically via the 'shmem_enabled' interfaces.
>>>
>>> [1] https://lore.kernel.org/all/
>>> ec927492-4577-4192-8fad-85eb1bb43121@linux.alibaba.com/
>>> [2] https://lore.kernel.org/
>>> all/875dc63b-0cd2-49e5-8b0d-3fb062789813@kernel.org/
>>> Signed-off-by: Baolin Wang <baolin.wang@linux.alibaba.com>
>>> ---
>>> Changes from v2:
>>>   - Always support large folios for internal shmem mount, per David.
>>> Changes from v1:
>>>   - Update the comments and commit message, per Lance.
>>> ---
>>>   mm/shmem.c | 13 +++++++++++--
>>>   1 file changed, 11 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
>>>
>>> diff --git a/mm/shmem.c b/mm/shmem.c
>>> index 4ecefe02881d..769ef37b1ea9 100644
>>> --- a/mm/shmem.c
>>> +++ b/mm/shmem.c
>>> @@ -3088,8 +3088,17 @@ static struct inode *__shmem_get_inode(struct
>>> mnt_idmap *idmap,
>>>       if (sbinfo->noswap)
>>>           mapping_set_unevictable(inode->i_mapping);
>>>   -    /* Don't consider 'deny' for emergencies and 'force' for
>>> testing */
>>> -    if (sbinfo->huge)
>>> +    /*
>>> +     * Always support large folios for the internal shmem mount (e.g.,
>>> +     * anonymous shmem), and which large order allocations are allowed
>>> +     * can be configured dynamically via the 'shmem_enabled'
>>> interfaces.
>>> +     *
>>> +     * For tmpfs, honour the 'huge=' mount option to determine whether
>>> +     * large folios are supported.
>>> +     *
>>> +     * Note: don't consider 'deny' for emergencies and 'force' for
>>> testing.
>>> +     */
>>> +    if (sbinfo->huge || (sb->s_flags & SB_KERNMOUNT))
>>>           mapping_set_large_folios(inode->i_mapping);
>>
>> Two questions from a non-fs person about the semantics here:
>>
>> a) Can sbinfo->huge be triggered later, for example, through a remount
>> (staring at shmem_reconfigure())
>
> For tmpfs, yes.

So, we could pass this check here, not setting
mapping_set_large_folios(), but later someone toggles it and we missed
to set mapping_set_large_folios()?

Or would we always go through another __shmem_get_inode() after a remount?

--
Cheers,

David