Re: [PATCH] tmpfs: fix regressions from wider use of ZERO_PAGE

Andrew Morton
2022-04-12T23:39:00Z

On Fri, 8 Apr 2022 23:08:29 -0700 (PDT) Hugh Dickins <hughd@google.com> wrote:

> >
> > Either way I'd rather do this optimization in iov_iter_zero rather
> > than hiding it in tmpfs.
>
> Let's see what others say. I think we would all prefer clear_user() to be
> enhanced, and hack around it neither here in tmpfs nor in iov_iter_zero().
> But that careful work won't get done by magic, nor by me.
>
> And iov_iter_zero() has to deal with a wider range of possibilities,
> when pulling in cache lines of ZERO_PAGE(0) will be less advantageous,
> than in tmpfs doing a large dd - the case I'm aiming not to regress here
> (tmpfs has been copying ZERO_PAGE(0) like this for years).

We do need something to get 5.18 fixed. Christoph, do you think we
should proceed with this patch for 5.18?