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-KVM Lock Overview
-=================
-
-1. Acquisition Orders
----------------------
-
-The acquisition orders for mutexes are as follows:
-
-- kvm->lock is taken outside vcpu->mutex
-
-- kvm->lock is taken outside kvm->slots_lock and kvm->irq_lock
-
-- kvm->slots_lock is taken outside kvm->irq_lock, though acquiring
- them together is quite rare.
-
-On x86, vcpu->mutex is taken outside kvm->arch.hyperv.hv_lock.
-
-Everything else is a leaf: no other lock is taken inside the critical
-sections.
-
-2: Exception
-------------
-
-Fast page fault:
-
-Fast page fault is the fast path which fixes the guest page fault out of
-the mmu-lock on x86. Currently, the page fault can be fast in one of the
-following two cases:
-
-1. Access Tracking: The SPTE is not present, but it is marked for access
-tracking i.e. the SPTE_SPECIAL_MASK is set. That means we need to
-restore the saved R/X bits. This is described in more detail later below.
-
-2. Write-Protection: The SPTE is present and the fault is
-caused by write-protect. That means we just need to change the W bit of the
-spte.
-
-What we use to avoid all the race is the SPTE_HOST_WRITEABLE bit and
-SPTE_MMU_WRITEABLE bit on the spte:
-- SPTE_HOST_WRITEABLE means the gfn is writable on host.
-- SPTE_MMU_WRITEABLE means the gfn is writable on mmu. The bit is set when
- the gfn is writable on guest mmu and it is not write-protected by shadow
- page write-protection.
-
-On fast page fault path, we will use cmpxchg to atomically set the spte W
-bit if spte.SPTE_HOST_WRITEABLE = 1 and spte.SPTE_WRITE_PROTECT = 1, or
-restore the saved R/X bits if VMX_EPT_TRACK_ACCESS mask is set, or both. This
-is safe because whenever changing these bits can be detected by cmpxchg.
-
-But we need carefully check these cases:
-1): The mapping from gfn to pfn
-The mapping from gfn to pfn may be changed since we can only ensure the pfn
-is not changed during cmpxchg. This is a ABA problem, for example, below case
-will happen:
-
-At the beginning:
-gpte = gfn1
-gfn1 is mapped to pfn1 on host
-spte is the shadow page table entry corresponding with gpte and
-spte = pfn1
-
- VCPU 0 VCPU0
-on fast page fault path:
-
- old_spte = *spte;
- pfn1 is swapped out:
- spte = 0;
-
- pfn1 is re-alloced for gfn2.
-
- gpte is changed to point to
- gfn2 by the guest:
- spte = pfn1;
-
- if (cmpxchg(spte, old_spte, old_spte+W)
- mark_page_dirty(vcpu->kvm, gfn1)
- OOPS!!!
-
-We dirty-log for gfn1, that means gfn2 is lost in dirty-bitmap.
-
-For direct sp, we can easily avoid it since the spte of direct sp is fixed
-to gfn. For indirect sp, before we do cmpxchg, we call gfn_to_pfn_atomic()
-to pin gfn to pfn, because after gfn_to_pfn_atomic():
-- We have held the refcount of pfn that means the pfn can not be freed and
- be reused for another gfn.
-- The pfn is writable that means it can not be shared between different gfns
- by KSM.
-
-Then, we can ensure the dirty bitmaps is correctly set for a gfn.
-
-Currently, to simplify the whole things, we disable fast page fault for
-indirect shadow page.
-
-2): Dirty bit tracking
-In the origin code, the spte can be fast updated (non-atomically) if the
-spte is read-only and the Accessed bit has already been set since the
-Accessed bit and Dirty bit can not be lost.
-
-But it is not true after fast page fault since the spte can be marked
-writable between reading spte and updating spte. Like below case:
-
-At the beginning:
-spte.W = 0
-spte.Accessed = 1
-
- VCPU 0 VCPU0
-In mmu_spte_clear_track_bits():
-
- old_spte = *spte;
-
- /* 'if' condition is satisfied. */
- if (old_spte.Accessed == 1 &&
- old_spte.W == 0)
- spte = 0ull;
- on fast page fault path:
- spte.W = 1
- memory write on the spte:
- spte.Dirty = 1
-
-
- else
- old_spte = xchg(spte, 0ull)
-
-
- if (old_spte.Accessed == 1)
- kvm_set_pfn_accessed(spte.pfn);
- if (old_spte.Dirty == 1)
- kvm_set_pfn_dirty(spte.pfn);
- OOPS!!!
-
-The Dirty bit is lost in this case.
-
-In order to avoid this kind of issue, we always treat the spte as "volatile"
-if it can be updated out of mmu-lock, see spte_has_volatile_bits(), it means,
-the spte is always atomically updated in this case.
-
-3): flush tlbs due to spte updated
-If the spte is updated from writable to readonly, we should flush all TLBs,
-otherwise rmap_write_protect will find a read-only spte, even though the
-writable spte might be cached on a CPU's TLB.
-
-As mentioned before, the spte can be updated to writable out of mmu-lock on
-fast page fault path, in order to easily audit the path, we see if TLBs need
-be flushed caused by this reason in mmu_spte_update() since this is a common
-function to update spte (present -> present).
-
-Since the spte is "volatile" if it can be updated out of mmu-lock, we always
-atomically update the spte, the race caused by fast page fault can be avoided,
-See the comments in spte_has_volatile_bits() and mmu_spte_update().
-
-Lockless Access Tracking:
-
-This is used for Intel CPUs that are using EPT but do not support the EPT A/D
-bits. In this case, when the KVM MMU notifier is called to track accesses to a
-page (via kvm_mmu_notifier_clear_flush_young), it marks the PTE as not-present
-by clearing the RWX bits in the PTE and storing the original R & X bits in
-some unused/ignored bits. In addition, the SPTE_SPECIAL_MASK is also set on the
-PTE (using the ignored bit 62). When the VM tries to access the page later on,
-a fault is generated and the fast page fault mechanism described above is used
-to atomically restore the PTE to a Present state. The W bit is not saved when
-the PTE is marked for access tracking and during restoration to the Present
-state, the W bit is set depending on whether or not it was a write access. If
-it wasn't, then the W bit will remain clear until a write access happens, at
-which time it will be set using the Dirty tracking mechanism described above.
-
-3. Reference
-------------
-
-Name: kvm_lock
-Type: mutex
-Arch: any
-Protects: - vm_list
-
-Name: kvm_count_lock
-Type: raw_spinlock_t
-Arch: any
-Protects: - hardware virtualization enable/disable
-Comment: 'raw' because hardware enabling/disabling must be atomic /wrt
- migration.
-
-Name: kvm_arch::tsc_write_lock
-Type: raw_spinlock
-Arch: x86
-Protects: - kvm_arch::{last_tsc_write,last_tsc_nsec,last_tsc_offset}
- - tsc offset in vmcb
-Comment: 'raw' because updating the tsc offsets must not be preempted.
-
-Name: kvm->mmu_lock
-Type: spinlock_t
-Arch: any
-Protects: -shadow page/shadow tlb entry
-Comment: it is a spinlock since it is used in mmu notifier.
-
-Name: kvm->srcu
-Type: srcu lock
-Arch: any
-Protects: - kvm->memslots
- - kvm->buses
-Comment: The srcu read lock must be held while accessing memslots (e.g.
- when using gfn_to_* functions) and while accessing in-kernel
- MMIO/PIO address->device structure mapping (kvm->buses).
- The srcu index can be stored in kvm_vcpu->srcu_idx per vcpu
- if it is needed by multiple functions.
-
-Name: blocked_vcpu_on_cpu_lock
-Type: spinlock_t
-Arch: x86
-Protects: blocked_vcpu_on_cpu
-Comment: This is a per-CPU lock and it is used for VT-d posted-interrupts.
- When VT-d posted-interrupts is supported and the VM has assigned
- devices, we put the blocked vCPU on the list blocked_vcpu_on_cpu
- protected by blocked_vcpu_on_cpu_lock, when VT-d hardware issues
- wakeup notification event since external interrupts from the
- assigned devices happens, we will find the vCPU on the list to
- wakeup.