Re: [PATCH 07/15] mm: Add ___GFP_NOTRACE

From: Tom Zanussi
Date: Mon Mar 02 2015 - 13:03:33 EST


On Mon, 2015-03-02 at 09:58 -0800, Alexei Starovoitov wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 2, 2015 at 8:46 AM, Tom Zanussi <tom.zanussi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > On Mon, 2015-03-02 at 11:37 -0500, Steven Rostedt wrote:
> >> On Mon, 2 Mar 2015 10:01:00 -0600
> >> Tom Zanussi <tom.zanussi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >>
> >> > Add a gfp flag that allows kmalloc() et al to be used in tracing
> >> > functions.
> >> >
> >> > The problem with using kmalloc for tracing is that the tracing
> >> > subsystem should be able to trace kmalloc itself, which it can't do
> >> > directly because of paths like kmalloc()->trace_kmalloc()->kmalloc()
> >> > or kmalloc()->trace_mm_page_alloc()->kmalloc().
> >>
> >> This part I don't like at all. Why can't the memory be preallocated
> >> when the hist is created (the echo 'hist:...')?
> >>
> >
> > Yeah, I didn't like it either. My original version did exactly what you
> > suggest and preallocated an array of entries to 'allocate' from in order
> > to avoid the problem.
> >
> > But I wanted to attempt to use the bpf_map directly, which already uses
> > kmalloc internally. My fallback in case this wouldn't fly, which it
> > obviously won't, would be to add an option to have the bpf_map code
> > preallocate a maximum number of entries or pass in a client-owned array
> > for the purpose. I'll do that if I don't hear any better ideas..
>
> Tom, I'm still reading through the patch set.
> Quick comment for the above.
> Currently there are two map types: array and hash.
> array type is pre-allocating all memory at map creation time.
> hash is allocating on demand.

OK, so would it make sense to do the same for the hash type, or at least
add an option that does that?

Tom


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