| Memory Resource Controller(Memcg) Implementation Memo. |
| Last Updated: 2008/12/15 |
| Base Kernel Version: based on 2.6.28-rc8-mm. |
| |
| Because VM is getting complex (one of reasons is memcg...), memcg's behavior |
| is complex. This is a document for memcg's internal behavior. |
| Please note that implementation details can be changed. |
| |
| (*) Topics on API should be in Documentation/cgroups/memory.txt) |
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| 0. How to record usage ? |
| 2 objects are used. |
| |
| page_cgroup ....an object per page. |
| Allocated at boot or memory hotplug. Freed at memory hot removal. |
| |
| swap_cgroup ... an entry per swp_entry. |
| Allocated at swapon(). Freed at swapoff(). |
| |
| The page_cgroup has USED bit and double count against a page_cgroup never |
| occurs. swap_cgroup is used only when a charged page is swapped-out. |
| |
| 1. Charge |
| |
| a page/swp_entry may be charged (usage += PAGE_SIZE) at |
| |
| mem_cgroup_newpage_charge() |
| Called at new page fault and Copy-On-Write. |
| |
| mem_cgroup_try_charge_swapin() |
| Called at do_swap_page() (page fault on swap entry) and swapoff. |
| Followed by charge-commit-cancel protocol. (With swap accounting) |
| At commit, a charge recorded in swap_cgroup is removed. |
| |
| mem_cgroup_cache_charge() |
| Called at add_to_page_cache() |
| |
| mem_cgroup_cache_charge_swapin() |
| Called at shmem's swapin. |
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| mem_cgroup_prepare_migration() |
| Called before migration. "extra" charge is done and followed by |
| charge-commit-cancel protocol. |
| At commit, charge against oldpage or newpage will be committed. |
| |
| 2. Uncharge |
| a page/swp_entry may be uncharged (usage -= PAGE_SIZE) by |
| |
| mem_cgroup_uncharge_page() |
| Called when an anonymous page is fully unmapped. I.e., mapcount goes |
| to 0. If the page is SwapCache, uncharge is delayed until |
| mem_cgroup_uncharge_swapcache(). |
| |
| mem_cgroup_uncharge_cache_page() |
| Called when a page-cache is deleted from radix-tree. If the page is |
| SwapCache, uncharge is delayed until mem_cgroup_uncharge_swapcache(). |
| |
| mem_cgroup_uncharge_swapcache() |
| Called when SwapCache is removed from radix-tree. The charge itself |
| is moved to swap_cgroup. (If mem+swap controller is disabled, no |
| charge to swap occurs.) |
| |
| mem_cgroup_uncharge_swap() |
| Called when swp_entry's refcnt goes down to 0. A charge against swap |
| disappears. |
| |
| mem_cgroup_end_migration(old, new) |
| At success of migration old is uncharged (if necessary), a charge |
| to new page is committed. At failure, charge to old page is committed. |
| |
| 3. charge-commit-cancel |
| In some case, we can't know this "charge" is valid or not at charging |
| (because of races). |
| To handle such case, there are charge-commit-cancel functions. |
| mem_cgroup_try_charge_XXX |
| mem_cgroup_commit_charge_XXX |
| mem_cgroup_cancel_charge_XXX |
| these are used in swap-in and migration. |
| |
| At try_charge(), there are no flags to say "this page is charged". |
| at this point, usage += PAGE_SIZE. |
| |
| At commit(), the function checks the page should be charged or not |
| and set flags or avoid charging.(usage -= PAGE_SIZE) |
| |
| At cancel(), simply usage -= PAGE_SIZE. |
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| Under below explanation, we assume CONFIG_MEM_RES_CTRL_SWAP=y. |
| |
| 4. Anonymous |
| Anonymous page is newly allocated at |
| - page fault into MAP_ANONYMOUS mapping. |
| - Copy-On-Write. |
| It is charged right after it's allocated before doing any page table |
| related operations. Of course, it's uncharged when another page is used |
| for the fault address. |
| |
| At freeing anonymous page (by exit() or munmap()), zap_pte() is called |
| and pages for ptes are freed one by one.(see mm/memory.c). Uncharges |
| are done at page_remove_rmap() when page_mapcount() goes down to 0. |
| |
| Another page freeing is by page-reclaim (vmscan.c) and anonymous |
| pages are swapped out. In this case, the page is marked as |
| PageSwapCache(). uncharge() routine doesn't uncharge the page marked |
| as SwapCache(). It's delayed until __delete_from_swap_cache(). |
| |
| 4.1 Swap-in. |
| At swap-in, the page is taken from swap-cache. There are 2 cases. |
| |
| (a) If the SwapCache is newly allocated and read, it has no charges. |
| (b) If the SwapCache has been mapped by processes, it has been |
| charged already. |
| |
| This swap-in is one of the most complicated work. In do_swap_page(), |
| following events occur when pte is unchanged. |
| |
| (1) the page (SwapCache) is looked up. |
| (2) lock_page() |
| (3) try_charge_swapin() |
| (4) reuse_swap_page() (may call delete_swap_cache()) |
| (5) commit_charge_swapin() |
| (6) swap_free(). |
| |
| Considering following situation for example. |
| |
| (A) The page has not been charged before (2) and reuse_swap_page() |
| doesn't call delete_from_swap_cache(). |
| (B) The page has not been charged before (2) and reuse_swap_page() |
| calls delete_from_swap_cache(). |
| (C) The page has been charged before (2) and reuse_swap_page() doesn't |
| call delete_from_swap_cache(). |
| (D) The page has been charged before (2) and reuse_swap_page() calls |
| delete_from_swap_cache(). |
| |
| memory.usage/memsw.usage changes to this page/swp_entry will be |
| Case (A) (B) (C) (D) |
| Event |
| Before (2) 0/ 1 0/ 1 1/ 1 1/ 1 |
| =========================================== |
| (3) +1/+1 +1/+1 +1/+1 +1/+1 |
| (4) - 0/ 0 - -1/ 0 |
| (5) 0/-1 0/ 0 -1/-1 0/ 0 |
| (6) - 0/-1 - 0/-1 |
| =========================================== |
| Result 1/ 1 1/ 1 1/ 1 1/ 1 |
| |
| In any cases, charges to this page should be 1/ 1. |
| |
| 4.2 Swap-out. |
| At swap-out, typical state transition is below. |
| |
| (a) add to swap cache. (marked as SwapCache) |
| swp_entry's refcnt += 1. |
| (b) fully unmapped. |
| swp_entry's refcnt += # of ptes. |
| (c) write back to swap. |
| (d) delete from swap cache. (remove from SwapCache) |
| swp_entry's refcnt -= 1. |
| |
| |
| At (b), the page is marked as SwapCache and not uncharged. |
| At (d), the page is removed from SwapCache and a charge in page_cgroup |
| is moved to swap_cgroup. |
| |
| Finally, at task exit, |
| (e) zap_pte() is called and swp_entry's refcnt -=1 -> 0. |
| Here, a charge in swap_cgroup disappears. |
| |
| 5. Page Cache |
| Page Cache is charged at |
| - add_to_page_cache_locked(). |
| |
| uncharged at |
| - __remove_from_page_cache(). |
| |
| The logic is very clear. (About migration, see below) |
| Note: __remove_from_page_cache() is called by remove_from_page_cache() |
| and __remove_mapping(). |
| |
| 6. Shmem(tmpfs) Page Cache |
| Memcg's charge/uncharge have special handlers of shmem. The best way |
| to understand shmem's page state transition is to read mm/shmem.c. |
| But brief explanation of the behavior of memcg around shmem will be |
| helpful to understand the logic. |
| |
| Shmem's page (just leaf page, not direct/indirect block) can be on |
| - radix-tree of shmem's inode. |
| - SwapCache. |
| - Both on radix-tree and SwapCache. This happens at swap-in |
| and swap-out, |
| |
| It's charged when... |
| - A new page is added to shmem's radix-tree. |
| - A swp page is read. (move a charge from swap_cgroup to page_cgroup) |
| It's uncharged when |
| - A page is removed from radix-tree and not SwapCache. |
| - When SwapCache is removed, a charge is moved to swap_cgroup. |
| - When swp_entry's refcnt goes down to 0, a charge in swap_cgroup |
| disappears. |
| |
| 7. Page Migration |
| One of the most complicated functions is page-migration-handler. |
| Memcg has 2 routines. Assume that we are migrating a page's contents |
| from OLDPAGE to NEWPAGE. |
| |
| Usual migration logic is.. |
| (a) remove the page from LRU. |
| (b) allocate NEWPAGE (migration target) |
| (c) lock by lock_page(). |
| (d) unmap all mappings. |
| (e-1) If necessary, replace entry in radix-tree. |
| (e-2) move contents of a page. |
| (f) map all mappings again. |
| (g) pushback the page to LRU. |
| (-) OLDPAGE will be freed. |
| |
| Before (g), memcg should complete all necessary charge/uncharge to |
| NEWPAGE/OLDPAGE. |
| |
| The point is.... |
| - If OLDPAGE is anonymous, all charges will be dropped at (d) because |
| try_to_unmap() drops all mapcount and the page will not be |
| SwapCache. |
| |
| - If OLDPAGE is SwapCache, charges will be kept at (g) because |
| __delete_from_swap_cache() isn't called at (e-1) |
| |
| - If OLDPAGE is page-cache, charges will be kept at (g) because |
| remove_from_swap_cache() isn't called at (e-1) |
| |
| memcg provides following hooks. |
| |
| - mem_cgroup_prepare_migration(OLDPAGE) |
| Called after (b) to account a charge (usage += PAGE_SIZE) against |
| memcg which OLDPAGE belongs to. |
| |
| - mem_cgroup_end_migration(OLDPAGE, NEWPAGE) |
| Called after (f) before (g). |
| If OLDPAGE is used, commit OLDPAGE again. If OLDPAGE is already |
| charged, a charge by prepare_migration() is automatically canceled. |
| If NEWPAGE is used, commit NEWPAGE and uncharge OLDPAGE. |
| |
| But zap_pte() (by exit or munmap) can be called while migration, |
| we have to check if OLDPAGE/NEWPAGE is a valid page after commit(). |
| |
| 8. LRU |
| Each memcg has its own private LRU. Now, it's handling is under global |
| VM's control (means that it's handled under global zone->lru_lock). |
| Almost all routines around memcg's LRU is called by global LRU's |
| list management functions under zone->lru_lock(). |
| |
| A special function is mem_cgroup_isolate_pages(). This scans |
| memcg's private LRU and call __isolate_lru_page() to extract a page |
| from LRU. |
| (By __isolate_lru_page(), the page is removed from both of global and |
| private LRU.) |
| |
| |
| 9. Typical Tests. |
| |
| Tests for racy cases. |
| |
| 9.1 Small limit to memcg. |
| When you do test to do racy case, it's good test to set memcg's limit |
| to be very small rather than GB. Many races found in the test under |
| xKB or xxMB limits. |
| (Memory behavior under GB and Memory behavior under MB shows very |
| different situation.) |
| |
| 9.2 Shmem |
| Historically, memcg's shmem handling was poor and we saw some amount |
| of troubles here. This is because shmem is page-cache but can be |
| SwapCache. Test with shmem/tmpfs is always good test. |
| |
| 9.3 Migration |
| For NUMA, migration is an another special case. To do easy test, cpuset |
| is useful. Following is a sample script to do migration. |
| |
| mount -t cgroup -o cpuset none /opt/cpuset |
| |
| mkdir /opt/cpuset/01 |
| echo 1 > /opt/cpuset/01/cpuset.cpus |
| echo 0 > /opt/cpuset/01/cpuset.mems |
| echo 1 > /opt/cpuset/01/cpuset.memory_migrate |
| mkdir /opt/cpuset/02 |
| echo 1 > /opt/cpuset/02/cpuset.cpus |
| echo 1 > /opt/cpuset/02/cpuset.mems |
| echo 1 > /opt/cpuset/02/cpuset.memory_migrate |
| |
| In above set, when you moves a task from 01 to 02, page migration to |
| node 0 to node 1 will occur. Following is a script to migrate all |
| under cpuset. |
| -- |
| move_task() |
| { |
| for pid in $1 |
| do |
| /bin/echo $pid >$2/tasks 2>/dev/null |
| echo -n $pid |
| echo -n " " |
| done |
| echo END |
| } |
| |
| G1_TASK=`cat ${G1}/tasks` |
| G2_TASK=`cat ${G2}/tasks` |
| move_task "${G1_TASK}" ${G2} & |
| -- |
| 9.4 Memory hotplug. |
| memory hotplug test is one of good test. |
| to offline memory, do following. |
| # echo offline > /sys/devices/system/memory/memoryXXX/state |
| (XXX is the place of memory) |
| This is an easy way to test page migration, too. |
| |
| 9.5 mkdir/rmdir |
| When using hierarchy, mkdir/rmdir test should be done. |
| Use tests like the following. |
| |
| echo 1 >/opt/cgroup/01/memory/use_hierarchy |
| mkdir /opt/cgroup/01/child_a |
| mkdir /opt/cgroup/01/child_b |
| |
| set limit to 01. |
| add limit to 01/child_b |
| run jobs under child_a and child_b |
| |
| create/delete following groups at random while jobs are running. |
| /opt/cgroup/01/child_a/child_aa |
| /opt/cgroup/01/child_b/child_bb |
| /opt/cgroup/01/child_c |
| |
| running new jobs in new group is also good. |
| |
| 9.6 Mount with other subsystems. |
| Mounting with other subsystems is a good test because there is a |
| race and lock dependency with other cgroup subsystems. |
| |
| example) |
| # mount -t cgroup none /cgroup -t cpuset,memory,cpu,devices |
| |
| and do task move, mkdir, rmdir etc...under this. |