Re: [PATCH 00/13] KVM: MMU: fast page fault

Xiao Guangrong
2012-03-29T11:41:05Z

On 03/29/2012 06:18 PM, Avi Kivity wrote:

> On 03/29/2012 11:20 AM, Xiao Guangrong wrote:
>> * Idea
>> The present bit of page fault error code (EFEC.P) indicates whether the
>> page table is populated on all levels, if this bit is set, we can know
>> the page fault is caused by the page-protection bits (e.g. W/R bit) or
>> the reserved bits.
>>
>> In KVM, in most cases, all this kind of page fault (EFEC.P = 1) can be
>> simply fixed: the page fault caused by reserved bit
>> (EFFC.P = 1 && EFEC.RSV = 1) has already been filtered out in fast mmio
>> path. What we need do to fix the rest page fault (EFEC.P = 1 && RSV != 1)
>> is just increasing the corresponding access on the spte.
>>
>> This pachset introduces a fast path to fix this kind of page fault: it
>> is out of mmu-lock and need not walk host page table to get the mapping
>> from gfn to pfn.
>
> Wow!
>
> Looks like interesting times are back in mmu-land.
>

:)

> Comments below are before review of actual patches, so maybe they're
> already answered there, or maybe they're just nonsense.
>

Your comments are always appreciated!

>> * Implementation
>> We can freely walk the page between walk_shadow_page_lockless_begin and
>> walk_shadow_page_lockless_end, it can ensure all the shadow page is valid.
>>
>> In the most case, cmpxchg is fair enough to change the access bit of spte,
>> but the write-protect path on softmmu/nested mmu is a especial case: it is
>> a read-check-modify path: read spte, check W bit, then clear W bit.
>
> We also set gpte.D and gpte.A, no? How do you handle that?
>

We still need walk gust page table before fast page fault to check
whether the access is valid.

>> In order
>> to avoid marking spte writable after/during page write-protect, we do the
>> trick like below:
>>
>> fast page fault path:
>> lock RCU
>> set identification in the spte
>
> What if you can't (already taken)? Spin? Slow path?

In this patch, it allows to concurrently access on the same spte:
it freely set its identification on the spte, because i did not
want to introduce other atomic operations.

You remind me that there may be a risk: if many vcpu fault on the
same spte, it will retry the spte forever. Hmm, how about fix it
like this:

if ( spte.identification = 0) {
set spte.identification = vcpu.id
goto cmpxchg-path
}

if (spte.identification == vcpu.id)
goto cmpxchg-path

return to guest and retry the address again;

cmpxchg-path:
do checks and cmpxchg

It can ensure the spte can be updated.

>> The identification should be unique to avoid the below race:
>>
>> VCPU 0 VCPU 1 VCPU 2
>> lock RCU
>> spte + identification
>> check conditions
>> do write-protect, clear
>> identification
>> lock RCU
>> set identification
>> cmpxchg + w - identification
>> OOPS!!!
>
> Is it not sufficient to use just two bits?
>
> pf_lock - taken by page fault path
> wp_lock - taken by write protect path
>
> pf cmpxchg checks both bits.
>

If we just use two byte as identification, it has to use atomic
operations to maintain these bits? or i misunderstood?

>> - For ept:
>> $ x11perfcomp baseline-hard optimaze-hard
>> 1: baseline-hard
>> 2: optimaze-hard
>>
>> 1 2 Operation
>> -------- -------- ---------
>> 7060.0 7150.0 Composite 500x500 from pixmap to window
>>
>> - For shadow mmu:
>> $ x11perfcomp baseline-soft optimaze-soft
>> 1: baseline-soft
>> 2: optimaze-soft
>>
>> 1 2 Operation
>> -------- -------- ---------
>> 6980.0 7490.0 Composite 500x500 from pixmap to window
>>
>> ( It is interesting that after this patch, the performance of x11perf on
>> softmmu is better than it on hardmmu, i have tested it for many times,
>> it is really true. :) )
>
> It could be because you cannot use THP with dirty logging, so you pay
> the overhead of TDP.
>

Yes, i think so.

>> Any comments are welcome. :)
>>
>
> Very impressive. Now to review the patches (will take me some time).
>

Thank you, Avi!