From: Serapheim Dimitropoulos <serapheim.dimitro@xxxxxxxxxxx> Subject: mm/vmalloc: use rb_tree instead of list for vread() lookups vread() has been linearly searching vmap_area_list for looking up vmalloc areas to read from. These same areas are also tracked by a rb_tree (vmap_area_root) which offers logarithmic lookup. This patch modifies vread() to use the rb_tree structure instead of the list and the speedup for heavy /proc/kcore readers can be pretty significant. Below are the wall clock measurements of a Python application that leverages the drgn debugging library to read and interpret data read from /proc/kcore. Before the patch: ----- $ time sudo sdb -e 'dbuf | head 3000 | wc' (unsigned long)3000 real 0m22.446s user 0m2.321s sys 0m20.690s ----- With the patch: ----- $ time sudo sdb -e 'dbuf | head 3000 | wc' (unsigned long)3000 real 0m2.104s user 0m2.043s sys 0m0.921s ----- Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20210209190253.108763-1-serapheim@xxxxxxxxxxx Signed-off-by: Serapheim Dimitropoulos <serapheim@xxxxxxxxxxx> Reviewed-by: Uladzislau Rezki (Sony) <urezki@xxxxxxxxx> Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> --- mm/vmalloc.c | 5 ++++- 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-) --- a/mm/vmalloc.c~mm-vmalloc-use-rb_tree-instead-of-list-for-vread-lookups +++ a/mm/vmalloc.c @@ -2894,7 +2894,10 @@ long vread(char *buf, char *addr, unsign count = -(unsigned long) addr; spin_lock(&vmap_area_lock); - list_for_each_entry(va, &vmap_area_list, list) { + va = __find_vmap_area((unsigned long)addr); + if (!va) + goto finished; + list_for_each_entry_from(va, &vmap_area_list, list) { if (!count) break; _