Re: [PATCH v7 4/4] kexec_file: Load kernel at top of system RAM if required

[Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>]

On Thu, 19 Jul 2018 23:17:53 +0800 Baoquan He <bhe@redhat.com> wrote:

> Hi Andrew,
> 
> On 07/18/18 at 03:33pm, Andrew Morton wrote:
> > On Wed, 18 Jul 2018 10:49:44 +0800 Baoquan He <bhe@redhat.com> wrote:
> > 
> > > For kexec_file loading, if kexec_buf.top_down is 'true', the memory which
> > > is used to load kernel/initrd/purgatory is supposed to be allocated from
> > > top to down. This is what we have been doing all along in the old kexec
> > > loading interface and the kexec loading is still default setting in some
> > > distributions. However, the current kexec_file loading interface doesn't
> > > do like this. The function arch_kexec_walk_mem() it calls ignores checking
> > > kexec_buf.top_down, but calls walk_system_ram_res() directly to go through
> > > all resources of System RAM from bottom to up, to try to find memory region
> > > which can contain the specific kexec buffer, then call locate_mem_hole_callback()
> > > to allocate memory in that found memory region from top to down. This brings
> > > confusion especially when KASLR is widely supported , users have to make clear
> > > why kexec/kdump kernel loading position is different between these two
> > > interfaces in order to exclude unnecessary noises. Hence these two interfaces
> > > need be unified on behaviour.
> > 
> > As far as I can tell, the above is the whole reason for the patchset,
> > yes?  To avoid confusing users.
> 
> 
> In fact, it's not just trying to avoid confusing users. Kexec loading
> and kexec_file loading are just do the same thing in essence. Just we
> need do kernel image verification on uefi system, have to port kexec
> loading code to kernel. 
> 
> Kexec has been a formal feature in our distro, and customers owning
> those kind of very large machine can make use of this feature to speed
> up the reboot process. On uefi machine, the kexec_file loading will
> search place to put kernel under 4G from top to down. As we know, the
> 1st 4G space is DMA32 ZONE, dma, pci mmcfg, bios etc all try to consume
> it. It may have possibility to not be able to find a usable space for
> kernel/initrd. From the top down of the whole memory space, we don't
> have this worry. 
> 
> And at the first post, I just posted below with AKASHI's
> walk_system_ram_res_rev() version. Later you suggested to use
> list_head to link child sibling of resource, see what the code change
> looks like.
> http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20180322033722.9279-1-bhe@redhat.com
> 
> Then I posted v2
> http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20180408024724.16812-1-bhe@redhat.com
> Rob Herring mentioned that other components which has this tree struct
> have planned to do the same thing, replacing the singly linked list with
> list_head to link resource child sibling. Just quote Rob's words as
> below. I think this could be another reason.
> 
> ~~~~~ From Rob
> The DT struct device_node also has the same tree structure with
> parent, child, sibling pointers and converting to list_head had been
> on the todo list for a while. ACPI also has some tree walking
> functions (drivers/acpi/acpica/pstree.c). Perhaps there should be a
> common tree struct and helpers defined either on top of list_head or a
> ~~~~~
> new struct if that saves some size.

Please let's get all this into the changelogs?

> > 
> > Is that sufficient?  Can we instead simplify their lives by providing
> > better documentation or informative printks or better Kconfig text,
> > etc?
> > 
> > And who *are* the people who are performing this configuration?  Random
> > system administrators?  Linux distro engineers?  If the latter then
> > they presumably aren't easily confused!
> 
> Kexec was invented for kernel developer to speed up their kernel
> rebooting. Now high end sever admin, kernel developer and QE are also
> keen to use it to reboot large box for faster feature testing, bug
> debugging. Kernel dev could know this well, about kernel loading
> position, admin or QE might not be aware of it very well. 
> 
> > 
> > In other words, I'm trying to understand how much benefit this patchset
> > will provide to our users as a whole.
> 
> Understood. The list_head replacing patch truly involes too many code
> changes, it's risky. I am willing to try any idea from reviewers, won't
> persuit they have to be accepted finally. If don't have a try, we don't
> know what it looks like, and what impact it may have. I am fine to take
> AKASHI's simple version of walk_system_ram_res_rev() to lower risk, even
> though it could be a little bit low efficient.

The larger patch produces a better result.  We can handle it ;)
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