[patch] mm, page_alloc: make __GFP_NOFAIL really not fail

[David Rientjes]

__GFP_NOFAIL specifies that the page allocator cannot fail to return
memory.  Allocators that call it may not even check for NULL upon
returning.

It turns out GFP_NOWAIT | __GFP_NOFAIL or GFP_ATOMIC | __GFP_NOFAIL can
actually return NULL.  More interestingly, processes that are doing
direct reclaim and have PF_MEMALLOC set may also return NULL for any
__GFP_NOFAIL allocation.

This patch fixes it so that the page allocator never actually returns
NULL as expected for __GFP_NOFAIL.  It turns out that no code actually
does anything as crazy as GFP_ATOMIC | __GFP_NOFAIL currently, so this
is more for correctness than a bug fix for that issue.

Signed-off-by: David Rientjes <rientjes@xxxxxxxxxx>
---
 mm/page_alloc.c | 24 +++++++++++++-----------
 1 file changed, 13 insertions(+), 11 deletions(-)

diff --git a/mm/page_alloc.c b/mm/page_alloc.c
--- a/mm/page_alloc.c
+++ b/mm/page_alloc.c
@@ -2535,17 +2535,19 @@ rebalance:
 		}
 	}
 
-	/* Atomic allocations - we can't balance anything */
-	if (!wait)
-		goto nopage;
-
-	/* Avoid recursion of direct reclaim */
-	if (current->flags & PF_MEMALLOC)
-		goto nopage;
-
-	/* Avoid allocations with no watermarks from looping endlessly */
-	if (test_thread_flag(TIF_MEMDIE) && !(gfp_mask & __GFP_NOFAIL))
-		goto nopage;
+	if (likely(!(gfp_mask & __GFP_NOFAIL))) {
+		/* Atomic allocations - we can't balance anything */
+		if (!wait)
+			goto nopage;
+
+		/* Avoid recursion of direct reclaim */
+		if (current->flags & PF_MEMALLOC)
+			goto nopage;
+
+		/* Avoid allocations with no watermarks from looping forever */
+		if (test_thread_flag(TIF_MEMDIE))
+			goto nopage;
+	}
 
 	/*
 	 * Try direct compaction. The first pass is asynchronous. Subsequent
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/