futex.c and fault handling

From: Darren Hart
Date: Fri Dec 19 2008 - 17:19:31 EST


I've been working in linux-tip core/futexes lately and have a need to be able to properly handle faults for r/w access to a uaddr. I was planning on modeling this on the fault handling in futex_lock_pi which used both get_user() and futex_handle_fault() to get the pages. However, that used to be based on whether or not we held the mmap_sem. Now that we're using fast_gup throughout futex.c, and the mmap_sem locking has been pushed in tighter in get_futex_key(), I'm not sure if the fault handling is still correct - the comments are certainly incorrect since we no longer hold the mmap_sem when we hit uaddr_faulted: inside futex_lock_pi (and a few other places have similar comment vs. code dicrepancies):

uaddr_faulted:
/*
* We have to r/w *(int __user *)uaddr, and we have to modify it
* atomically. Therefore, if we continue to fault after get_user()
* below, we need to handle the fault ourselves, while still holding
* the mmap_sem. This can occur if the uaddr is under contention as
* we have to drop the mmap_sem in order to call get_user().
*/
queue_unlock(&q, hb);

if (attempt++) {
ret = futex_handle_fault((unsigned long)uaddr, attempt);
if (ret)
goto out_put_key;
goto retry_unlocked;
}

---> previous versions dropped the mmap_sem here in preparation for get_user()

ret = get_user(uval, uaddr);
if (!ret)
goto retry;


So is the code still correct without the holding of mmap_sem? I suppose get_user() is still the more efficient path, and perhaps even more so now that we don't have to release mmap_sem and reacquire it later in order to call it. If so, then I guess all that is needed is a comments patch, which I'd be happy to write up.

Thanks,

--
Darren Hart
IBM Linux Technology Center
Real-Time Linux Team
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