[PATCH 0/9] vfio/pci: Add mmap() for DMABUFs

Matt Evans
2026-04-16T13:18:42Z

Hi all,

This series is based on previous RFCs/discussions:

Tech topic: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-iommu/20250918214425.2677057-1-amastro@fb.com/
RFCv1: https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260226202211.929005-1-mattev@meta.com/
RFCv2: https://lore.kernel.org/kvm/20260312184613.3710705-1-mattev@meta.com/

The background/rationale is covered in more detail in the RFC cover
letters. The TL;DR is:

The goal is to enable userspace driver designs that use VFIO to export
DMABUFs representing subsets of PCI device BARs, and "vend" those
buffers from a primary process to other subordinate processes by fd.
These processes then mmap() the buffers and their access to the device
is isolated to the exported ranges. This is an improvement on sharing
the VFIO device fd to subordinate processes, which would allow
unfettered access .

This is achieved by enabling mmap() of vfio-pci DMABUFs. Second, a
new ioctl()-based revocation mechanism is added to allow the primary
process to forcibly revoke access to previously-shared BAR spans, even
if the subordinate processes haven't cleanly exited.

(The related topic of safe delegation of iommufd control to the
subordinate processes is not addressed here, and is follow-up work.)

As well as isolation and revocation, another advantage to accessing a
BAR through a VMA backed by a DMABUF is that it's straightforward to
create the buffer with access attributes, such as write-combining.

Notes on patches
================

Feedback from the RFCs requested that, instead of creating
DMABUF-specific vm_ops and .fault paths, to go the whole way and
migrate the existing VFIO PCI BAR mmap() to be backed by a DMABUF too,
resulting in a common vm_ops and fault handler for mmap()s of both the
VFIO device and explicitly-exported DMABUFs. This has been done for
vfio-pci, but not sub-drivers (nvgrace-gpu's special-case mappings are
unchanged).

vfio/pci: Fix vfio_pci_dma_buf_cleanup() double-put

A bug fix to a related are, whose context is a depdency for later
patches.

vfio/pci: Add a helper to look up PFNs for DMABUFs
vfio/pci: Add a helper to create a DMABUF for a BAR-map VMA

The first is for a DMABUF VMA fault handler to determine
arbitrary-sized PFNs from ranges in DMABUF. Secondly, refactor
DMABUF export for use by the existing export feature and a new
helper that creates a DMABUF corresponding to a VFIO BAR mmap()
request.

vfio/pci: Convert BAR mmap() to use a DMABUF

The vfio-pci core mmap() creates a DMABUF with the helper, and the
vm_ops fault handler uses the other helper to resolve the fault.
Because this depends on DMABUF structs/code, CONFIG_VFIO_PCI_CORE
needs to depend on CONFIG_DMA_SHARED_BUFFER. The
CONFIG_VFIO_PCI_DMABUF still conditionally enables the export
support code.

NOTE: The user mmap()s a device fd, but the resulting VMA's vm_file
becomes that of the DMABUF which takes ownership of the device and
puts it on release. This maintains the existing behaviour of a VMA
keeping the VFIO device open.

BAR zapping then happens via the existing vfio_pci_dma_buf_move()
path, which now needs to unmap PTEs in the DMABUF's address_space.

vfio/pci: Provide a user-facing name for BAR mappings

There was a request for decent debug naming in /proc/<pid>/maps
etc. comparable to the existing VFIO names: since the VMAs are
DMABUFs, they have a "dmabuf:" prefix and can't be 100% identical
to before. This is a user-visible change, but this patch at least
now gives us extra info on the BDF & BAR being mapped.

vfio/pci: Clean up BAR zap and revocation

In general (see NOTE!) the vfio_pci_zap_bars() is now obsolete,
since it unmaps PTEs in the VFIO device address_space which is now
unused. This consolidates all calls (e.g. around reset) with the
neighbouring vfio_pci_dma_buf_move()s into new functions, to
revoke-zap/unrevoke.

NOTE: the nvgrace-gpu driver continues to use its own private
vm_ops, fault handler, etc. for its special memregions, and these
DO still add PTEs to the VFIO device address_space. So, a
temporary flag, vdev->bar_needs_zap, maintains the old behaviour
for this use. At least this patch's consolidation makes it easy
to remove the remaining zap when this need goes away.

A FIXME is added: if nvgrace-gpu is converted to DMABUFs, remove
the flag and final zap.

vfio/pci: Support mmap() of a VFIO DMABUF

Adds mmap() for a DMABUF fd exported from vfio-pci.

It was a goal to keep the VFIO device fd lifetime behaviour
unchanged with respect to the DMABUFs. An application can close
all device fds, and this will revoke/clean up all DMABUFs; no
mappings or other access can be performed now. When enabling
mmap() of the DMABUFs, this means access through the VMA is also
revoked. This complicates the fault handler because whilst the
DMABUF exists, it has no guarantee that the corresponding VFIO
device is still alive. Adds synchronisation ensuring the vdev is
available before vdev->memory_lock is touched.

(I decided against the alternative of preventing cleanup by holding
the VFIO device open if any DMABUFs exist, because it's both a
change of behaviour and less clean overall.)

I've added a chonky comment in place, happy to clarify more if you
have ideas.

vfio/pci: Permanently revoke a DMABUF on request

By weight, this is mostly a rename of revoked to an enum, status.
There are now 3 states for a buffer, usable and revoked
temporary/permanent. A new VFIO device ioctl is added,
VFIO_DEVICE_PCI_DMABUF_REVOKE, which passes a DMABUF (exported from
that device) and permanently revokes it. Thus a userspace driver
can guarantee any downstream consumers of a shared fd are prevented
from accessing a BAR range, and that range can be reused.

The code doing revocation in vfio_pci_dma_buf_move() is moved,
unchanged, to a common function for use by _move() and the new
ioctl path.

Q: I can't think of a good reason to temporarily revoke/unrevoke
buffers from userspace, so didn't add a 'flags' field to the ioctl
struct. Easy to add if people think it's worthwhile for future
use.

vfio/pci: Add mmap() attributes to DMABUF feature

Reserves bits [31:28] in vfio_device_feature_dma_buf to allow a
(CPU) mapping attribute to be specified for an exported set of
ranges. The default is the current UC, and a new flag can specify
CPU access as WC.

Q: I've taken 4 bits; the intention is for this field to be a
scalar not a bitmap (i.e. mutually-exclusive access properties).
Perhaps 4 is a bit too many?

Testing
=======

(The [RFC ONLY] userspace test program, for QEMU edu-plus, has been
dropped, but can be found in the GitHub branch below.)

This code has been tested in mapping DMABUFs of single/multiple
ranges, aliasing mmap()s, aliasing ranges across DMABUFs, vm_pgoff >
0, revocation, shutdown/cleanup scenarios, and hugepage mappings seem
to work correctly. I've lightly tested WC mappings also (by observing
resulting PTEs as having the correct attributes...). No regressions
observed on the VFIO selftests, or on our internal vfio-pci
applications.

End
===

This is based on -next (next-20260414 but will merge earlier), as it
depends on Leon's series "vfio: Wait for dma-buf invalidation to
complete":

https://lore.kernel.org/linux-iommu/20260205-nocturnal-poetic-chamois-f566ad@houat/T/#m310cd07011e3a1461b6fda45e3f9b886ba76571a

These commits are on GitHub, along with "[RFC ONLY] selftests: vfio: Add
standalone vfio_dmabuf_mmap_test":

https://github.com/metamev/linux/compare/next-20260414...metamev:linux:dev/mev/vfio-dmabuf-mmap

Thanks for reading,

Matt

================================================================================
Change log:

v1:

- Cleanup of the common DMABUF-aware VMA vm_ops fault handler and
export code.
- Fixed a lot of races, particularly faults racing with DMABUF
cleanup (if the VFIO device fds close, for example).
- Added nicer human-readable names for VFIO mmap() VMAs

RFCv2: Respin based on the feedback/suggestions:
https://lore.kernel.org/kvm/20260312184613.3710705-1-mattev@meta.com/

- Transform the existing VFIO BAR mmap path to also use DMABUFs
behind the scenes, and then simply share that code for
explicitly-mapped DMABUFs. Jason wanted to go that direction to
enable iommufd VFIO type 1 emulation to pick up a DMABUF for an IO
mapping.

- Revoke buffers using a VFIO device fd ioctl

RFCv1:
https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260226202211.929005-1-mattev@meta.com/

Matt Evans (9):
vfio/pci: Fix vfio_pci_dma_buf_cleanup() double-put
vfio/pci: Add a helper to look up PFNs for DMABUFs
vfio/pci: Add a helper to create a DMABUF for a BAR-map VMA
vfio/pci: Convert BAR mmap() to use a DMABUF
vfio/pci: Provide a user-facing name for BAR mappings
vfio/pci: Clean up BAR zap and revocation
vfio/pci: Support mmap() of a VFIO DMABUF
vfio/pci: Permanently revoke a DMABUF on request
vfio/pci: Add mmap() attributes to DMABUF feature

drivers/vfio/pci/Kconfig | 3 +-
drivers/vfio/pci/Makefile | 3 +-
drivers/vfio/pci/nvgrace-gpu/main.c | 5 +
drivers/vfio/pci/vfio_pci_config.c | 30 +-
drivers/vfio/pci/vfio_pci_core.c | 224 ++++++++++---
drivers/vfio/pci/vfio_pci_dmabuf.c | 500 +++++++++++++++++++++++-----
drivers/vfio/pci/vfio_pci_priv.h | 49 ++-
include/linux/vfio_pci_core.h | 1 +
include/uapi/linux/vfio.h | 42 ++-
9 files changed, 690 insertions(+), 167 deletions(-)

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2.47.3