On Mon, Apr 20, 2020 at 02:55:23PM +0100, Will Deacon wrote: > On Mon, Apr 20, 2020 at 01:36:28PM +0100, Mark Rutland wrote: > > On Mon, Apr 20, 2020 at 01:23:51PM +0100, Will Deacon wrote: > > > IIUC, we don't need to do anything on arm64 because taking an exception acts > > > as a context synchronization event, so I don't think you should try to > > > expose this as a new barrier macro. Instead, just make it a pre-requisite > > > that architectures need to ensure this behaviour when entering the kernel > > > from userspace if they are to select HAVE_ARCH_TASK_ISOLATION. > > > > The CSE from the exception isn't sufficient here, because it needs to > > occur after the CPU has re-registered to receive IPIs for > > kick_all_cpus_sync(). Otherwise there's a window between taking the > > exception and re-registering where a necessary context synchronization > > event can be missed. e.g. > > > > CPU A CPU B > > [ Modifies some code ] > > [ enters exception ] > > [ D cache maintenance ] > > [ I cache maintenance ] > > [ IPI ] // IPI not taken > > ... [ register for IPI ] > > [ IPI completes ] > > [ execute stale code here ] > > Thanks. > > > However, I think 'IMB' is far too generic, and we should have an arch > > hook specific to task isolation, as it's far less likely to be abused as > > IMB will. > > What guarantees we don't run any unsynchronised module code between > exception entry and registering for the IPI? It seems like we'd want that > code to run as early as possible, e.g. as part of > task_isolation_user_exit() but that doesn't seem to be what's happening. Sorry, I guess that's more a question for Alex. Alex -- do you think we could move the "register for IPI" step earlier so that it's easier to reason about the code that runs in the dead zone during exception entry? Will