On Thu, May 6, 2010 at 9:22 AM, Mel Gorman <mel@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On Wed, May 05, 2010 at 11:02:25AM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote: >> >> >> On Wed, 5 May 2010, Mel Gorman wrote: >> > >> > If the same_vma list is properly ordered then maybe something like the >> > following is allowed? >> >> Heh. This is the same logic I just sent out. However: >> >> > + anon_vma = page_rmapping(page); >> > + if (!anon_vma) >> > + return NULL; >> > + >> > + spin_lock(&anon_vma->lock); >> >> RCU should guarantee that this spin_lock() is valid, but: >> >> > + /* >> > + * Get the oldest anon_vma on the list by depending on the ordering >> > + * of the same_vma list setup by __page_set_anon_rmap >> > + */ >> > + avc = list_entry(&anon_vma->head, struct anon_vma_chain, same_anon_vma); >> >> We're not guaranteed that the 'anon_vma->head' list is non-empty. >> >> Somebody could have freed the list and the anon_vma and we have a stale >> 'page->anon_vma' (that has just not been _released_ yet). >> >> And shouldn't that be 'list_first_entry'? Or &anon_vma->head.next? >> >> How did that line actually work for you? Or was it just a "it boots", but >> no actual testing of the rmap walk? >> > > This is what I just started testing on a 4-core machine. Lockdep didn't > complain but there are two potential sources of badness in anon_vma_lock_root > marked with XXX. The second is the most important because I can't see how the > local and root anon_vma locks can be safely swapped - i.e. release local and > get the root without the root disappearing. I haven't considered the other > possibilities yet such as always locking the root anon_vma. Going to > sleep on it. > > Any comments? <snip> > +/* Given an anon_vma, find the root of the chain, lock it and return the root */ > +struct anon_vma *anon_vma_lock_root(struct anon_vma *anon_vma) > +{ > + struct anon_vma *root_anon_vma; > + struct anon_vma_chain *avc, *root_avc; > + struct vm_area_struct *vma; > + > + /* Lock the same_anon_vma list and make sure we are on a chain */ > + spin_lock(&anon_vma->lock); > + if (list_empty(&anon_vma->head)) { > + spin_unlock(&anon_vma->lock); > + return NULL; > + } > + > + /* > + * Get the root anon_vma on the list by depending on the ordering > + * of the same_vma list setup by __page_set_anon_rmap. Basically > + * we are doing > + * > + * local anon_vma -> local vma -> deepest vma -> anon_vma > + */ > + avc = list_first_entry(&anon_vma->head, struct anon_vma_chain, same_anon_vma); Dumb question. I can't understand why we should use list_first_entry. I looked over the code. anon_vma_chain_link uses list_add_tail so I think that's right. But anon_vma_prepare uses list_add. So it's not consistent. How do we make sure list_first_entry returns deepest vma? Sorry if I am missing. -- Kind regards, Minchan Kim -- To unsubscribe, send a message with 'unsubscribe linux-mm' in the body to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxx For more info on Linux MM, see: http://www.linux-mm.org/ . Don't email: <a href