[PATCH mm-unstable v15 04/13] mm/khugepaged: introduce collapse_max_ptes_none helper function

Nico Pache
2026-02-26T03:24:24Z

The current mechanism for determining mTHP collapse scales the
khugepaged_max_ptes_none value based on the target order. This
introduces an undesirable feedback loop, or "creep", when max_ptes_none
is set to a value greater than HPAGE_PMD_NR / 2.

With this configuration, a successful collapse to order N will populate
enough pages to satisfy the collapse condition on order N+1 on the next
scan. This leads to unnecessary work and memory churn.

To fix this issue introduce a helper function that will limit mTHP
collapse support to two max_ptes_none values, 0 and HPAGE_PMD_NR - 1.
This effectively supports two modes:

- max_ptes_none=0: never introduce new none-pages for mTHP collapse.
- max_ptes_none=511 (on 4k pagesz): Always collapse to the highest
available mTHP order.

This removes the possiblilty of "creep", while not modifying any uAPI
expectations. A warning will be emitted if any non-supported
max_ptes_none value is configured with mTHP enabled.

Reviewed-by: Lorenzo Stoakes <lorenzo.stoakes@oracle.com>
Reviewed-by: Baolin Wang <baolin.wang@linux.alibaba.com>
Signed-off-by: Nico Pache <npache@redhat.com>
---
mm/khugepaged.c | 40 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++-
1 file changed, 39 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/mm/khugepaged.c b/mm/khugepaged.c
index ecdbbf6a01a6..99f78f0e44c6 100644
--- a/mm/khugepaged.c
+++ b/mm/khugepaged.c
@@ -456,6 +456,36 @@ void __khugepaged_enter(struct mm_struct *mm)
wake_up_interruptible(&khugepaged_wait);
}

+/**
+ * collapse_max_ptes_none - Calculate maximum allowed empty PTEs for collapse
+ * @order: The folio order being collapsed to
+ *
+ * For PMD-sized collapses (order == HPAGE_PMD_ORDER), use the configured
+ * khugepaged_max_ptes_none value.
+ *
+ * For mTHP collapses, we currently only support khugepaged_max_pte_none values
+ * of 0 or (COLLAPSE_MAX_PTES_LIMIT). Any other value will emit a warning and
+ * no mTHP collapse will be attempted
+ *
+ * Return: Maximum number of empty PTEs allowed for the collapse operation
+ */
+static unsigned int collapse_max_ptes_none(unsigned int order)
+{
+ if (is_pmd_order(order))
+ return khugepaged_max_ptes_none;
+
+ /* Zero/non-present collapse disabled. */
+ if (!khugepaged_max_ptes_none)
+ return 0;
+
+ if (khugepaged_max_ptes_none == COLLAPSE_MAX_PTES_LIMIT)
+ return (1 << order) - 1;
+
+ pr_warn_once("mTHP collapse only supports max_ptes_none values of 0 or %u\n",
+ COLLAPSE_MAX_PTES_LIMIT);
+ return -EINVAL;
+}
+
void khugepaged_enter_vma(struct vm_area_struct *vma,
vm_flags_t vm_flags)
{
@@ -541,10 +571,18 @@ static enum scan_result __collapse_huge_page_isolate(struct vm_area_struct *vma,
struct folio *folio = NULL;
unsigned long addr = start_addr;
pte_t *_pte;
+ int max_ptes_none;
int none_or_zero = 0, shared = 0, referenced = 0;
enum scan_result result = SCAN_FAIL;
const unsigned long nr_pages = 1UL << order;
- int max_ptes_none = khugepaged_max_ptes_none >> (HPAGE_PMD_ORDER - order);
+
+ if (cc->is_khugepaged)
+ max_ptes_none = collapse_max_ptes_none(order);
+ else
+ max_ptes_none = COLLAPSE_MAX_PTES_LIMIT;
+
+ if (max_ptes_none == -EINVAL)
+ return result;

for (_pte = pte; _pte < pte + nr_pages;
_pte++, addr += PAGE_SIZE) {
--
2.53.0