On 2026/1/24 07:26, Nico Pache wrote:
On Thu, Jan 22, 2026 at 10:08 PM Lance Yang <[email protected]> wrote:



On 2026/1/23 03:28, Nico Pache wrote:
The khugepaged daemon and madvise_collapse have two different
implementations that do almost the same thing.

Create collapse_single_pmd to increase code reuse and create an entry
point to these two users.

Refactor madvise_collapse and collapse_scan_mm_slot to use the new
collapse_single_pmd function. This introduces a minor behavioral change
that is most likely an undiscovered bug. The current implementation of
khugepaged tests collapse_test_exit_or_disable before calling
collapse_pte_mapped_thp, but we weren't doing it in the madvise_collapse
case. By unifying these two callers madvise_collapse now also performs
this check. We also modify the return value to be SCAN_ANY_PROCESS which
properly indicates that this process is no longer valid to operate on.

We also guard the khugepaged_pages_collapsed variable to ensure its only
incremented for khugepaged.

Reviewed-by: Wei Yang <[email protected]>
Reviewed-by: Lance Yang <[email protected]>
Reviewed-by: Lorenzo Stoakes <[email protected]>
Reviewed-by: Baolin Wang <[email protected]>
Reviewed-by: Zi Yan <[email protected]>
Acked-by: David Hildenbrand <[email protected]>
Signed-off-by: Nico Pache <[email protected]>
---

I think this patch introduces some functional changes compared to previous
version[1] ...

Maybe we should drop the r-b tags and let folks take another look?

There might be an issue with the vma access in madvise_collapse(). See
below:

[1]
https://lore.kernel.org/linux-mm/[email protected]/

   mm/khugepaged.c | 106 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++---------------------
   1 file changed, 60 insertions(+), 46 deletions(-)

diff --git a/mm/khugepaged.c b/mm/khugepaged.c
index fefcbdca4510..59e5a5588d85 100644
--- a/mm/khugepaged.c
+++ b/mm/khugepaged.c
@@ -2394,6 +2394,54 @@ static enum scan_result collapse_scan_file(struct 
mm_struct *mm, unsigned long a
       return result;
   }

+/*
+ * Try to collapse a single PMD starting at a PMD aligned addr, and return
+ * the results.
+ */
+static enum scan_result collapse_single_pmd(unsigned long addr,
+             struct vm_area_struct *vma, bool *mmap_locked,
+             struct collapse_control *cc)
+{
+     struct mm_struct *mm = vma->vm_mm;
+     enum scan_result result;
+     struct file *file;
+     pgoff_t pgoff;
+
+     if (vma_is_anonymous(vma)) {
+             result = collapse_scan_pmd(mm, vma, addr, mmap_locked, cc);
+             goto end;
+     }
+
+     file = get_file(vma->vm_file);
+     pgoff = linear_page_index(vma, addr);
+
+     mmap_read_unlock(mm);
+     *mmap_locked = false;
+     result = collapse_scan_file(mm, addr, file, pgoff, cc);
+     fput(file);
+
+     if (result != SCAN_PTE_MAPPED_HUGEPAGE)
+             goto end;
+
+     mmap_read_lock(mm);
+     *mmap_locked = true;
+     if (collapse_test_exit_or_disable(mm)) {
+             mmap_read_unlock(mm);
+             *mmap_locked = false;
+             return SCAN_ANY_PROCESS;
+     }
+     result = try_collapse_pte_mapped_thp(mm, addr, !cc->is_khugepaged);
+     if (result == SCAN_PMD_MAPPED)
+             result = SCAN_SUCCEED;
+     mmap_read_unlock(mm);
+     *mmap_locked = false;
+
+end:
+     if (cc->is_khugepaged && result == SCAN_SUCCEED)
+             ++khugepaged_pages_collapsed;
+     return result;
+}
+
   static unsigned int collapse_scan_mm_slot(unsigned int pages, enum 
scan_result *result,
                                           struct collapse_control *cc)
       __releases(&khugepaged_mm_lock)
@@ -2466,34 +2514,9 @@ static unsigned int collapse_scan_mm_slot(unsigned int 
pages, enum scan_result *
                       VM_BUG_ON(khugepaged_scan.address < hstart ||
                                 khugepaged_scan.address + HPAGE_PMD_SIZE >
                                 hend);
-                     if (!vma_is_anonymous(vma)) {
-                             struct file *file = get_file(vma->vm_file);
-                             pgoff_t pgoff = linear_page_index(vma,
-                                             khugepaged_scan.address);
-
-                             mmap_read_unlock(mm);
-                             mmap_locked = false;
-                             *result = collapse_scan_file(mm,
-                                     khugepaged_scan.address, file, pgoff, cc);
-                             fput(file);
-                             if (*result == SCAN_PTE_MAPPED_HUGEPAGE) {
-                                     mmap_read_lock(mm);
-                                     if (collapse_test_exit_or_disable(mm))
-                                             goto breakouterloop;
-                                     *result = try_collapse_pte_mapped_thp(mm,
-                                             khugepaged_scan.address, false);
-                                     if (*result == SCAN_PMD_MAPPED)
-                                             *result = SCAN_SUCCEED;
-                                     mmap_read_unlock(mm);
-                             }
-                     } else {
-                             *result = collapse_scan_pmd(mm, vma,
-                                     khugepaged_scan.address, &mmap_locked, 
cc);
-                     }
-
-                     if (*result == SCAN_SUCCEED)
-                             ++khugepaged_pages_collapsed;

+                     *result = collapse_single_pmd(khugepaged_scan.address,
+                                                   vma, &mmap_locked, cc);
                       /* move to next address */
                       khugepaged_scan.address += HPAGE_PMD_SIZE;
                       progress += HPAGE_PMD_NR;
@@ -2799,6 +2822,7 @@ int madvise_collapse(struct vm_area_struct *vma, unsigned 
long start,
                       cond_resched();
                       mmap_read_lock(mm);
                       mmap_locked = true;
+                     *lock_dropped = true;
                       result = hugepage_vma_revalidate(mm, addr, false, &vma,
                                                        cc);
                       if (result  != SCAN_SUCCEED) {
@@ -2809,17 +2833,17 @@ int madvise_collapse(struct vm_area_struct *vma, 
unsigned long start,
                       hend = min(hend, vma->vm_end & HPAGE_PMD_MASK);
               }
               mmap_assert_locked(mm);
-             if (!vma_is_anonymous(vma)) {
-                     struct file *file = get_file(vma->vm_file);
-                     pgoff_t pgoff = linear_page_index(vma, addr);

-                     mmap_read_unlock(mm);
-                     mmap_locked = false;
+             result = collapse_single_pmd(addr, vma, &mmap_locked, cc);
+
+             if (!mmap_locked)
                       *lock_dropped = true;
-                     result = collapse_scan_file(mm, addr, file, pgoff, cc);

-                     if (result == SCAN_PAGE_DIRTY_OR_WRITEBACK && !triggered_wb 
&&
-                         mapping_can_writeback(file->f_mapping)) {
+             if (result == SCAN_PAGE_DIRTY_OR_WRITEBACK && !triggered_wb) {
+                     struct file *file = get_file(vma->vm_file);
+                     pgoff_t pgoff = linear_page_index(vma, addr);


After collapse_single_pmd() returns, mmap_lock might have been released.
Between
that unlock and here, another thread could unmap/remap the VMA, making
the vma
pointer stale when we access vma->vm_file?

+ Shivank, I thought they were on the CC list.

Hey! I thought of this case, but then figured it was no different than
what is currently implemented for the writeback-retry logic, since the
mmap lock is dropped and not revalidated. BUT I failed to consider
that the file reference is held throughout that time.

I thought of moving the functionality into collapse_single_pmd(), but
figured I'd keep it in madvise_collapse() as it's the sole user of
that functionality. Given the potential file ref issue, that may be
the best solution, and I dont think it should be too difficult. I'll
queue that up, and also drop the r-b tags as you suggested.

Ok, here's my solution, does this look like the right approach?:

Hey! Thanks for the quick fix!

diff --git a/mm/khugepaged.c b/mm/khugepaged.c
index 59e5a5588d85..dda9fdc35767 100644
--- a/mm/khugepaged.c
+++ b/mm/khugepaged.c
@@ -2418,6 +2418,14 @@ static enum scan_result
collapse_single_pmd(unsigned long addr,
         mmap_read_unlock(mm);
         *mmap_locked = false;
         result = collapse_scan_file(mm, addr, file, pgoff, cc);
+
+       if (!cc->is_khugepaged && result == SCAN_PAGE_DIRTY_OR_WRITEBACK &&
+           mapping_can_writeback(file->f_mapping)) {
+               loff_t lstart = (loff_t)pgoff << PAGE_SHIFT;
+               loff_t lend = lstart + HPAGE_PMD_SIZE - 1;
+
+               filemap_write_and_wait_range(file->f_mapping, lstart, lend);
+       }
         fput(file);

         if (result != SCAN_PTE_MAPPED_HUGEPAGE)
@@ -2840,19 +2848,8 @@ int madvise_collapse(struct vm_area_struct
*vma, unsigned long start,
                         *lock_dropped = true;

                 if (result == SCAN_PAGE_DIRTY_OR_WRITEBACK && !triggered_wb) {
-                       struct file *file = get_file(vma->vm_file);
-                       pgoff_t pgoff = linear_page_index(vma, addr);
-
-                       if (mapping_can_writeback(file->f_mapping)) {
-                               loff_t lstart = (loff_t)pgoff << PAGE_SHIFT;
-                               loff_t lend = lstart + HPAGE_PMD_SIZE - 1;
-
-
filemap_write_and_wait_range(file->f_mapping, lstart, lend);
-                               triggered_wb = true;
-                               fput(file);
-                               goto retry;
-                       }
-                       fput(file);
+                       triggered_wb = true;
+                       goto retry;
                 }

                 switch (result) {



-- Nico

From a quick glimpse, that looks good to me ;)

Only madvise needs writeback and then retry once, and khugepaged just
skips dirty pages and moves on.

Now, we grab the file reference before dropping mmap_lock, then only
use the file pointer during writeback - no vma access after unlock.

So even if the VMA gets unmapped, we're safe, IIUC.

[...]

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