Re: [PATCH v3 01/10] KVM: arm64: Document PV-time interface

Andrew Jones
2019-08-29T17:15:55Z

On Wed, Aug 21, 2019 at 04:36:47PM +0100, Steven Price wrote:
> Introduce a paravirtualization interface for KVM/arm64 based on the
> "Arm Paravirtualized Time for Arm-Base Systems" specification DEN 0057A.
>
> This only adds the details about "Stolen Time" as the details of "Live
> Physical Time" have not been fully agreed.
>
> User space can specify a reserved area of memory for the guest and
> inform KVM to populate the memory with information on time that the host
> kernel has stolen from the guest.
>
> A hypercall interface is provided for the guest to interrogate the
> hypervisor's support for this interface and the location of the shared
> memory structures.
>
> Signed-off-by: Steven Price <steven.price@arm.com>
> ---
> Documentation/virt/kvm/arm/pvtime.txt | 100 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> 1 file changed, 100 insertions(+)
> create mode 100644 Documentation/virt/kvm/arm/pvtime.txt
>
> diff --git a/Documentation/virt/kvm/arm/pvtime.txt b/Documentation/virt/kvm/arm/pvtime.txt
> new file mode 100644
> index 000000000000..1ceb118694e7
> --- /dev/null
> +++ b/Documentation/virt/kvm/arm/pvtime.txt
> @@ -0,0 +1,100 @@
> +Paravirtualized time support for arm64
> +======================================
> +
> +Arm specification DEN0057/A defined a standard for paravirtualised time
> +support for AArch64 guests:
> +
> +https://developer.arm.com/docs/den0057/a
> +
> +KVM/arm64 implements the stolen time part of this specification by providing
> +some hypervisor service calls to support a paravirtualized guest obtaining a
> +view of the amount of time stolen from its execution.
> +
> +Two new SMCCC compatible hypercalls are defined:
> +
> +PV_FEATURES 0xC5000020
> +PV_TIME_ST 0xC5000022
> +
> +These are only available in the SMC64/HVC64 calling convention as
> +paravirtualized time is not available to 32 bit Arm guests. The existence of
> +the PV_FEATURES hypercall should be probed using the SMCCC 1.1 ARCH_FEATURES
> +mechanism before calling it.
> +
> +PV_FEATURES
> + Function ID: (uint32) : 0xC5000020
> + PV_func_id: (uint32) : Either PV_TIME_LPT or PV_TIME_ST
> + Return value: (int32) : NOT_SUPPORTED (-1) or SUCCESS (0) if the relevant
> + PV-time feature is supported by the hypervisor.
> +
> +PV_TIME_ST
> + Function ID: (uint32) : 0xC5000022
> + Return value: (int64) : IPA of the stolen time data structure for this
> + (V)CPU. On failure:

Why the () around the V in VCPU?

> + NOT_SUPPORTED (-1)
> +
> +The IPA returned by PV_TIME_ST should be mapped by the guest as normal memory
> +with inner and outer write back caching attributes, in the inner shareable
> +domain. A total of 16 bytes from the IPA returned are guaranteed to be
> +meaningfully filled by the hypervisor (see structure below).
> +
> +PV_TIME_ST returns the structure for the calling VCPU.

The above sentence seems redundant here.

> +
> +Stolen Time
> +-----------
> +
> +The structure pointed to by the PV_TIME_ST hypercall is as follows:
> +
> + Field | Byte Length | Byte Offset | Description
> + ----------- | ----------- | ----------- | --------------------------
> + Revision | 4 | 0 | Must be 0 for version 0.1
> + Attributes | 4 | 4 | Must be 0
> + Stolen time | 8 | 8 | Stolen time in unsigned
> + | | | nanoseconds indicating how
> + | | | much time this VCPU thread
> + | | | was involuntarily not
> + | | | running on a physical CPU.
> +
> +The structure will be updated by the hypervisor prior to scheduling a VCPU. It
> +will be present within a reserved region of the normal memory given to the
> +guest. The guest should not attempt to write into this memory. There is a
> +structure per VCPU of the guest.
> +
> +User space interface
> +====================
> +
> +User space can request that KVM provide the paravirtualized time interface to
> +a guest by creating a KVM_DEV_TYPE_ARM_PV_TIME device, for example:
> +
> + struct kvm_create_device pvtime_device = {
> + .type = KVM_DEV_TYPE_ARM_PV_TIME,
> + .attr = 0,
> + .flags = 0,
> + };
> +
> + pvtime_fd = ioctl(vm_fd, KVM_CREATE_DEVICE, &pvtime_device);

The ioctl doesn't return the fd. If the ioctl returns zero the fd will be
in pvtime_device.fd.

> +
> +Creation of the device should be done after creating the vCPUs of the virtual
> +machine.

Or else what? Will an error be reported in that case?

> +
> +The IPA of the structures must be given to KVM. This is the base address
> +of an array of stolen time structures (one for each VCPU). The base address
> +must be page aligned. The size must be at least 64 * number of VCPUs and be a
> +multiple of PAGE_SIZE.
> +
> +The memory for these structures should be added to the guest in the usual
> +manner (e.g. using KVM_SET_USER_MEMORY_REGION).

Above it says the guest shouldn't attempt to write the memory. Should
KVM_MEM_READONLY be used with KVM_SET_USER_MEMORY_REGION for it?

> +
> +For example:
> +
> + struct kvm_dev_arm_st_region region = {
> + .gpa = <IPA of guest base address>,
> + .size = <size in bytes>
> + };
> +
> + struct kvm_device_attr st_base = {
> + .group = KVM_DEV_ARM_PV_TIME_PADDR,

This is KVM_DEV_ARM_PV_TIME_REGION in the code.

> + .attr = KVM_DEV_ARM_PV_TIME_ST,
> + .addr = (u64)&region
> + };
> +
> + ioctl(pvtime_fd, KVM_SET_DEVICE_ATTR, &st_base);
> --
> 2.20.1
>

Thanks,
drew