[PATCH V4 mm-hotfixes 2/3] mm: introduce and use {pgd,p4d}_populate_kernel()

Harry Yoo
2025-08-11T05:35:26Z

Introduce and use {pgd,p4d}_populate_kernel() in core MM code when
populating PGD and P4D entries for the kernel address space.
These helpers ensure proper synchronization of page tables when
updating the kernel portion of top-level page tables.

Until now, the kernel has relied on each architecture to handle
synchronization of top-level page tables in an ad-hoc manner.
For example, see commit 9b861528a801 ("x86-64, mem: Update all PGDs for
direct mapping and vmemmap mapping changes").

However, this approach has proven fragile for following reasons:

1) It is easy to forget to perform the necessary page table
synchronization when introducing new changes.
For instance, commit 4917f55b4ef9 ("mm/sparse-vmemmap: improve memory
savings for compound devmaps") overlooked the need to synchronize
page tables for the vmemmap area.

2) It is also easy to overlook that the vmemmap and direct mapping areas
must not be accessed before explicit page table synchronization.
For example, commit 8d400913c231 ("x86/vmemmap: handle unpopulated
sub-pmd ranges")) caused crashes by accessing the vmemmap area
before calling sync_global_pgds().

To address this, as suggested by Dave Hansen, introduce _kernel() variants
of the page table population helpers, which invoke architecture-specific
hooks to properly synchronize page tables. These are introduced in a new
header file, include/linux/pgalloc.h, so they can be called from common code.

They reuse existing infrastructure for vmalloc and ioremap.
Synchronization requirements are determined by ARCH_PAGE_TABLE_SYNC_MASK,
and the actual synchronization is performed by arch_sync_kernel_mappings().

This change currently targets only x86_64, so only PGD and P4D level
helpers are introduced. In theory, PUD and PMD level helpers can be added
later if needed by other architectures.

Currently this is a no-op, since no architecture sets
PGTBL_{PGD,P4D}_MODIFIED in ARCH_PAGE_TABLE_SYNC_MASK.

Cc: <stable@vger.kernel.org>
Fixes: 8d400913c231 ("x86/vmemmap: handle unpopulated sub-pmd ranges")
Suggested-by: Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@linux.intel.com>
Signed-off-by: Harry Yoo <harry.yoo@oracle.com>
---
include/linux/pgalloc.h | 24 ++++++++++++++++++++++++
include/linux/pgtable.h | 4 ++--
mm/kasan/init.c | 12 ++++++------
mm/percpu.c | 6 +++---
mm/sparse-vmemmap.c | 6 +++---
5 files changed, 38 insertions(+), 14 deletions(-)
create mode 100644 include/linux/pgalloc.h

diff --git a/include/linux/pgalloc.h b/include/linux/pgalloc.h
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..290ab864320f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/include/linux/pgalloc.h
@@ -0,0 +1,24 @@
+/* SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0 */
+#ifndef _LINUX_PGALLOC_H
+#define _LINUX_PGALLOC_H
+
+#include <linux/pgtable.h>
+#include <asm/pgalloc.h>
+
+static inline void pgd_populate_kernel(unsigned long addr, pgd_t *pgd,
+ p4d_t *p4d)
+{
+ pgd_populate(&init_mm, pgd, p4d);
+ if (ARCH_PAGE_TABLE_SYNC_MASK & PGTBL_PGD_MODIFIED)
+ arch_sync_kernel_mappings(addr, addr);
+}
+
+static inline void p4d_populate_kernel(unsigned long addr, p4d_t *p4d,
+ pud_t *pud)
+{
+ p4d_populate(&init_mm, p4d, pud);
+ if (ARCH_PAGE_TABLE_SYNC_MASK & PGTBL_P4D_MODIFIED)
+ arch_sync_kernel_mappings(addr, addr);
+}
+
+#endif /* _LINUX_PGALLOC_H */
diff --git a/include/linux/pgtable.h b/include/linux/pgtable.h
index ba699df6ef69..0cf5c6c3e483 100644
--- a/include/linux/pgtable.h
+++ b/include/linux/pgtable.h
@@ -1469,8 +1469,8 @@ static inline void modify_prot_commit_ptes(struct vm_area_struct *vma, unsigned

/*
* Architectures can set this mask to a combination of PGTBL_P?D_MODIFIED values
- * and let generic vmalloc and ioremap code know when arch_sync_kernel_mappings()
- * needs to be called.
+ * and let generic vmalloc, ioremap and page table update code know when
+ * arch_sync_kernel_mappings() needs to be called.
*/
#ifndef ARCH_PAGE_TABLE_SYNC_MASK
#define ARCH_PAGE_TABLE_SYNC_MASK 0
diff --git a/mm/kasan/init.c b/mm/kasan/init.c
index ced6b29fcf76..8fce3370c84e 100644
--- a/mm/kasan/init.c
+++ b/mm/kasan/init.c
@@ -13,9 +13,9 @@
#include <linux/mm.h>
#include <linux/pfn.h>
#include <linux/slab.h>
+#include <linux/pgalloc.h>

#include <asm/page.h>
-#include <asm/pgalloc.h>

#include "kasan.h"

@@ -191,7 +191,7 @@ static int __ref zero_p4d_populate(pgd_t *pgd, unsigned long addr,
pud_t *pud;
pmd_t *pmd;

- p4d_populate(&init_mm, p4d,
+ p4d_populate_kernel(addr, p4d,
lm_alias(kasan_early_shadow_pud));
pud = pud_offset(p4d, addr);
pud_populate(&init_mm, pud,
@@ -212,7 +212,7 @@ static int __ref zero_p4d_populate(pgd_t *pgd, unsigned long addr,
} else {
p = early_alloc(PAGE_SIZE, NUMA_NO_NODE);
pud_init(p);
- p4d_populate(&init_mm, p4d, p);
+ p4d_populate_kernel(addr, p4d, p);
}
}
zero_pud_populate(p4d, addr, next);
@@ -251,10 +251,10 @@ int __ref kasan_populate_early_shadow(const void *shadow_start,
* puds,pmds, so pgd_populate(), pud_populate()
* is noops.
*/
- pgd_populate(&init_mm, pgd,
+ pgd_populate_kernel(addr, pgd,
lm_alias(kasan_early_shadow_p4d));
p4d = p4d_offset(pgd, addr);
- p4d_populate(&init_mm, p4d,
+ p4d_populate_kernel(addr, p4d,
lm_alias(kasan_early_shadow_pud));
pud = pud_offset(p4d, addr);
pud_populate(&init_mm, pud,
@@ -273,7 +273,7 @@ int __ref kasan_populate_early_shadow(const void *shadow_start,
if (!p)
return -ENOMEM;
} else {
- pgd_populate(&init_mm, pgd,
+ pgd_populate_kernel(addr, pgd,
early_alloc(PAGE_SIZE, NUMA_NO_NODE));
}
}
diff --git a/mm/percpu.c b/mm/percpu.c
index d9cbaee92b60..a56f35dcc417 100644
--- a/mm/percpu.c
+++ b/mm/percpu.c
@@ -3108,7 +3108,7 @@ int __init pcpu_embed_first_chunk(size_t reserved_size, size_t dyn_size,
#endif /* BUILD_EMBED_FIRST_CHUNK */

#ifdef BUILD_PAGE_FIRST_CHUNK
-#include <asm/pgalloc.h>
+#include <linux/pgalloc.h>

#ifndef P4D_TABLE_SIZE
#define P4D_TABLE_SIZE PAGE_SIZE
@@ -3134,13 +3134,13 @@ void __init __weak pcpu_populate_pte(unsigned long addr)

if (pgd_none(*pgd)) {
p4d = memblock_alloc_or_panic(P4D_TABLE_SIZE, P4D_TABLE_SIZE);
- pgd_populate(&init_mm, pgd, p4d);
+ pgd_populate_kernel(addr, pgd, p4d);
}

p4d = p4d_offset(pgd, addr);
if (p4d_none(*p4d)) {
pud = memblock_alloc_or_panic(PUD_TABLE_SIZE, PUD_TABLE_SIZE);
- p4d_populate(&init_mm, p4d, pud);
+ p4d_populate_kernel(addr, p4d, pud);
}

pud = pud_offset(p4d, addr);
diff --git a/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c b/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c
index 41aa0493eb03..dbd8daccade2 100644
--- a/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c
+++ b/mm/sparse-vmemmap.c
@@ -27,9 +27,9 @@
#include <linux/spinlock.h>
#include <linux/vmalloc.h>
#include <linux/sched.h>
+#include <linux/pgalloc.h>

#include <asm/dma.h>
-#include <asm/pgalloc.h>
#include <asm/tlbflush.h>

#include "hugetlb_vmemmap.h"
@@ -229,7 +229,7 @@ p4d_t * __meminit vmemmap_p4d_populate(pgd_t *pgd, unsigned long addr, int node)
if (!p)
return NULL;
pud_init(p);
- p4d_populate(&init_mm, p4d, p);
+ p4d_populate_kernel(addr, p4d, p);
}
return p4d;
}
@@ -241,7 +241,7 @@ pgd_t * __meminit vmemmap_pgd_populate(unsigned long addr, int node)
void *p = vmemmap_alloc_block_zero(PAGE_SIZE, node);
if (!p)
return NULL;
- pgd_populate(&init_mm, pgd, p);
+ pgd_populate_kernel(addr, pgd, p);
}
return pgd;
}
--
2.43.0