Re: [PATCH] x86/cpu: Add a VMX flag to enumerate 5-level EPT support to userspace

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On 2/23/2024 9:35 AM, Sean Christopherson wrote:
On Tue, 09 Jan 2024 16:23:40 -0800, Sean Christopherson wrote:
Add a VMX flag in /proc/cpuinfo, ept_5level, so that userspace can query
whether or not the CPU supports 5-level EPT paging.  EPT capabilities are
enumerated via MSR, i.e. aren't accessible to userspace without help from
the kernel, and knowing whether or not 5-level EPT is supported is sadly
necessary for userspace to correctly configure KVM VMs.

When EPT is enabled, bits 51:49 of guest physical addresses are consumed
if and only if 5-level EPT is enabled.  For CPUs with MAXPHYADDR > 48, KVM
*can't* map all legal guest memory if 5-level EPT is unsupported, e.g.
creating a VM with RAM (or anything that gets stuffed into KVM's memslots)
above bit 48 will be completely broken.

[...]

Applied to kvm-x86 vmx, with a massaged changelog to avoid presenting this as a
bug fix (and finally fixed the 51:49=>51:48 goof):

     Add a VMX flag in /proc/cpuinfo, ept_5level, so that userspace can query
     whether or not the CPU supports 5-level EPT paging.  EPT capabilities are
     enumerated via MSR, i.e. aren't accessible to userspace without help from
     the kernel, and knowing whether or not 5-level EPT is supported is useful
     for debug, triage, testing, etc.
For example, when EPT is enabled, bits 51:48 of guest physical addresses
     are consumed by the CPU if and only if 5-level EPT is enabled.  For CPUs
     with MAXPHYADDR > 48, KVM *can't* map all legal guest memory if 5-level
     EPT is unsupported, making it more or less necessary to know whether or
     not 5-level EPT is supported.

[1/1] x86/cpu: Add a VMX flag to enumerate 5-level EPT support to userspace
       https://github.com/kvm-x86/linux/commit/b1a3c366cbc7

Do we need a new KVM CAP for this? This decides how to interact with old kernel without this patch. In that case, no ept_5level in /proc/cpuinfo, what should we do in the absence of ept_5level? treat it only 4 level EPT supported?



--
https://github.com/kvm-x86/linux/tree/next






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