Re: Oops in a driver while using SLUB as a SLAB allocator

From: Nicolas Ferre <nicolas.ferre@rfo.atmel.com>
To: Russell King <rmk+lkml@arm.linux.org.uk>,
	Hugh Dickins <hugh@veritas.com>,
	Andrew Victor <andrew@sanpeople.com>
Cc: Christoph Lameter <clameter@sgi.com>,
	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>,
	ARM Linux Mailing List  <linux-arm-kernel@lists.arm.linux.org.uk>,
	Linux Kernel list <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
	Marc Pignat <marc.pignat@hevs.ch>,
	Andrew Victor <andrew@sanpeople.com>,
	Pierre Ossman <drzeus@drzeus.cx>,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Subject: Re: Oops in a driver while using SLUB as a SLAB allocator
Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2007 15:55:05 +0200	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <467FC939.3080603@rfo.atmel.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.64.0706250120560.28286@blonde.wat.veritas.com>

Hugh Dickins :
> On Sun, 24 Jun 2007, Russell King wrote:
>> On Sun, Jun 24, 2007 at 11:24:16AM +0100, Hugh Dickins wrote:
>>> On Sun, 24 Jun 2007, Russell King wrote:
>>>> On Fri, Jun 22, 2007 at 07:39:33PM +0100, Hugh Dickins wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Please forward the original problem report.
>>> Done.
>> Okay, that seems to back up my suspicions - it's definitely AT91-based.
>> Since AT91-based machines do not have a DMA coherent cache,
>> arch_is_coherent() must be defined to '0'.  The only way that kmalloc
>> could be reached is if that were defined to something other than '0',
>> and if that's done on a machine with DMA incoherent caches, that will
>> lead to data corruption.
> 
> Yes, having looked through that now, I agree with you 100%.

AT91 _is_ defined with the arch_is_coherent() switch set to 0 (in 
include/asm-arm/memory.h and not overloaded).

>> I think we need to wait for Nicolas to respond on this issue before
>> running headlong into applying a sticky plaster for something which is
>> actually a deeper issue.
> 
> No need for Nicolas to respond, I think I've found what's "wrong":
> see below.
> 
>> However, the arch_is_coherent() path _is_ buggy as it stands, but in
>> more than the way identified thus far.  Eg, it doesn't set __GFP_DMA
>> appropriately for various DMA masks, so it might return DMA inaccessible
>> memory.

Ok it is bad but, in AT91, all memory is accessible with DMA.

[..]

> The slub allocation which gives rise to Nicolas' oops in not in
> ARM, but (I'm guessing) in drivers/mmc/core/sd.c: one of those
> 	status = kmalloc(64, GFP_KERNEL);
> where status is passed down for the response from mmc_sd_switch.

True, the oops appears after a mmc switch command (#6 command).

[..]

Not sure I can add much to what Hugh has said. If you need some more 
precision anyway, I will try to answer.

Regards,
-- 
Nicolas Ferre