Re: [PATCH 5/6] kvm, x86: use ro page and don't copy shared page

Gleb Natapov
2010-07-17T04:31:36Z

On Fri, Jul 16, 2010 at 08:26:12PM -0300, Marcelo Tosatti wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 16, 2010 at 10:19:36AM +0300, Gleb Natapov wrote:
> > On Fri, Jul 16, 2010 at 10:13:07AM +0800, Lai Jiangshan wrote:
> > > When page fault, we always call get_user_pages(write=1).
> > >
> > > Actually, we don't need to do this when it is not write fault.
> > > get_user_pages(write=1) will cause shared page(ksm) copied.
> > > If this page is not modified in future, this copying and the copied page
> > > are just wasted. Ksm may scan and merge them and may cause thrash.
> > >
> > But is page is written into afterwords we will get another page fault.
> >
> > > In this patch, if the page is RO for host VMM and it not write fault for guest,
> > > we will use RO page, otherwise we use a writable page.
> > >
> > Currently pages allocated for guest memory are required to be RW, so after your series
> > behaviour will remain exactly the same as before.
>
> Except KSM pages.
>
KSM page will be COWed by __get_user_pages_fast(addr, 1, 1, page) in
get_user_page_and_protection() just like it COWed now, no?

> > > Signed-off-by: Lai Jiangshan <laijs@cn.fujitsu.com>
> > > ---
> > > diff --git a/arch/x86/kvm/mmu.c b/arch/x86/kvm/mmu.c
> > > index 8ba9b0d..6382140 100644
> > > --- a/arch/x86/kvm/mmu.c
> > > +++ b/arch/x86/kvm/mmu.c
> > > @@ -1832,6 +1832,45 @@ static void kvm_unsync_pages(struct kvm_vcpu *vcpu, gfn_t gfn)
> > > }
> > > }
> > >
> > > +/* get a current mapped page fast, and test whether the page is writable. */
> > > +static struct page *get_user_page_and_protection(unsigned long addr,
> > > + int *writable)
> > > +{
> > > + struct page *page[1];
> > > +
> > > + if (__get_user_pages_fast(addr, 1, 1, page) == 1) {
> > > + *writable = 1;
> > > + return page[0];
> > > + }
> > > + if (__get_user_pages_fast(addr, 1, 0, page) == 1) {
> > > + *writable = 0;
> > > + return page[0];
> > > + }
> > > + return NULL;
> > > +}
> > > +
> > > +static pfn_t kvm_get_pfn_for_page_fault(struct kvm *kvm, gfn_t gfn,
> > > + int write_fault, int *host_writable)
> > > +{
> > > + unsigned long addr;
> > > + struct page *page;
> > > +
> > > + if (!write_fault) {
> > > + addr = gfn_to_hva(kvm, gfn);
> > > + if (kvm_is_error_hva(addr)) {
> > > + get_page(bad_page);
> > > + return page_to_pfn(bad_page);
> > > + }
> > > +
> > > + page = get_user_page_and_protection(addr, host_writable);
> > > + if (page)
> > > + return page_to_pfn(page);
> > > + }
> > > +
> > > + *host_writable = 1;
> > > + return kvm_get_pfn_for_gfn(kvm, gfn);
> > > +}
> > > +
> > kvm_get_pfn_for_gfn() returns fault_page if page is mapped RO, so caller
> > of kvm_get_pfn_for_page_fault() and kvm_get_pfn_for_gfn() will get
> > different results when called on the same page. Not good.
> > kvm_get_pfn_for_page_fault() logic should be folded into
> > kvm_get_pfn_for_gfn().
>
> Agreed. Please keep gfn_to_pfn related code in virt/kvm/kvm_main.c.

--
Gleb.