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Date:   Thu, 12 Sep 2019 13:24:25 +0300
From:   "Kirill A. Shutemov" <kirill@shutemov.name>
To:     Michal Hocko <mhocko@kernel.org>
Cc:     Alexander Duyck <alexander.duyck@gmail.com>,
        Alexander Duyck <alexander.h.duyck@linux.intel.com>,
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On Thu, Sep 12, 2019 at 11:19:25AM +0200, Michal Hocko wrote:
> On Wed 11-09-19 08:12:03, Alexander Duyck wrote:
> > On Wed, Sep 11, 2019 at 4:36 AM Michal Hocko <mhocko@kernel.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > On Tue 10-09-19 14:23:40, Alexander Duyck wrote:
> > > [...]
> > > > We don't put any limitations on the allocator other then that it needs to
> > > > clean up the metadata on allocation, and that it cannot allocate a page
> > > > that is in the process of being reported since we pulled it from the
> > > > free_list. If the page is a "Reported" page then it decrements the
> > > > reported_pages count for the free_area and makes sure the page doesn't
> > > > exist in the "Boundary" array pointer value, if it does it moves the
> > > > "Boundary" since it is pulling the page.
> > >
> > > This is still a non-trivial limitation on the page allocation from an
> > > external code IMHO. I cannot give any explicit reason why an ordering on
> > > the free list might matter (well except for page shuffling which uses it
> > > to make physical memory pattern allocation more random) but the
> > > architecture seems hacky and dubious to be honest. It shoulds like the
> > > whole interface has been developed around a very particular and single
> > > purpose optimization.
> > 
> > How is this any different then the code that moves a page that will
> > likely be merged to the tail though?
> 
> I guess you are referring to the page shuffling. If that is the case
> then this is an integral part of the allocator for a reason and it is
> very well obvious in the code including the consequences. I do not
> really like an idea of hiding similar constrains behind a generic
> looking feature which is completely detached from the allocator and so
> any future change of the allocator might subtly break it.

I don't necessary follow why shuffling is more integral to page allocator
than reporting would be. It's next to shutffle.c under mm/ and integrated
in a simillar way.

-- 
 Kirill A. Shutemov