docs/vm: ksm: split userspace interface to admin-guide/mm/ksm.rst
Signed-off-by: Mike Rapoport <rppt@linux.vnet.ibm.com>
Signed-off-by: Jonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>
diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/index.rst b/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/index.rst
index 6c8b554..ad28644 100644
--- a/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/index.rst
+++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/index.rst
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@
hugetlbpage
idle_page_tracking
+ ksm
pagemap
soft-dirty
userfaultfd
diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/ksm.rst b/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/ksm.rst
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9303786
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/mm/ksm.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,189 @@
+.. _admin_guide_ksm:
+
+=======================
+Kernel Samepage Merging
+=======================
+
+Overview
+========
+
+KSM is a memory-saving de-duplication feature, enabled by CONFIG_KSM=y,
+added to the Linux kernel in 2.6.32. See ``mm/ksm.c`` for its implementation,
+and http://lwn.net/Articles/306704/ and http://lwn.net/Articles/330589/
+
+KSM was originally developed for use with KVM (where it was known as
+Kernel Shared Memory), to fit more virtual machines into physical memory,
+by sharing the data common between them. But it can be useful to any
+application which generates many instances of the same data.
+
+The KSM daemon ksmd periodically scans those areas of user memory
+which have been registered with it, looking for pages of identical
+content which can be replaced by a single write-protected page (which
+is automatically copied if a process later wants to update its
+content). The amount of pages that KSM daemon scans in a single pass
+and the time between the passes are configured using :ref:`sysfs
+intraface <ksm_sysfs>`
+
+KSM only merges anonymous (private) pages, never pagecache (file) pages.
+KSM's merged pages were originally locked into kernel memory, but can now
+be swapped out just like other user pages (but sharing is broken when they
+are swapped back in: ksmd must rediscover their identity and merge again).
+
+Controlling KSM with madvise
+============================
+
+KSM only operates on those areas of address space which an application
+has advised to be likely candidates for merging, by using the madvise(2)
+system call::
+
+ int madvise(addr, length, MADV_MERGEABLE)
+
+The app may call
+
+::
+
+ int madvise(addr, length, MADV_UNMERGEABLE)
+
+to cancel that advice and restore unshared pages: whereupon KSM
+unmerges whatever it merged in that range. Note: this unmerging call
+may suddenly require more memory than is available - possibly failing
+with EAGAIN, but more probably arousing the Out-Of-Memory killer.
+
+If KSM is not configured into the running kernel, madvise MADV_MERGEABLE
+and MADV_UNMERGEABLE simply fail with EINVAL. If the running kernel was
+built with CONFIG_KSM=y, those calls will normally succeed: even if the
+the KSM daemon is not currently running, MADV_MERGEABLE still registers
+the range for whenever the KSM daemon is started; even if the range
+cannot contain any pages which KSM could actually merge; even if
+MADV_UNMERGEABLE is applied to a range which was never MADV_MERGEABLE.
+
+If a region of memory must be split into at least one new MADV_MERGEABLE
+or MADV_UNMERGEABLE region, the madvise may return ENOMEM if the process
+will exceed ``vm.max_map_count`` (see Documentation/sysctl/vm.txt).
+
+Like other madvise calls, they are intended for use on mapped areas of
+the user address space: they will report ENOMEM if the specified range
+includes unmapped gaps (though working on the intervening mapped areas),
+and might fail with EAGAIN if not enough memory for internal structures.
+
+Applications should be considerate in their use of MADV_MERGEABLE,
+restricting its use to areas likely to benefit. KSM's scans may use a lot
+of processing power: some installations will disable KSM for that reason.
+
+.. _ksm_sysfs:
+
+KSM daemon sysfs interface
+==========================
+
+The KSM daemon is controlled by sysfs files in ``/sys/kernel/mm/ksm/``,
+readable by all but writable only by root:
+
+pages_to_scan
+ how many pages to scan before ksmd goes to sleep
+ e.g. ``echo 100 > /sys/kernel/mm/ksm/pages_to_scan``.
+
+ Default: 100 (chosen for demonstration purposes)
+
+sleep_millisecs
+ how many milliseconds ksmd should sleep before next scan
+ e.g. ``echo 20 > /sys/kernel/mm/ksm/sleep_millisecs``
+
+ Default: 20 (chosen for demonstration purposes)
+
+merge_across_nodes
+ specifies if pages from different NUMA nodes can be merged.
+ When set to 0, ksm merges only pages which physically reside
+ in the memory area of same NUMA node. That brings lower
+ latency to access of shared pages. Systems with more nodes, at
+ significant NUMA distances, are likely to benefit from the
+ lower latency of setting 0. Smaller systems, which need to
+ minimize memory usage, are likely to benefit from the greater
+ sharing of setting 1 (default). You may wish to compare how
+ your system performs under each setting, before deciding on
+ which to use. ``merge_across_nodes`` setting can be changed only
+ when there are no ksm shared pages in the system: set run 2 to
+ unmerge pages first, then to 1 after changing
+ ``merge_across_nodes``, to remerge according to the new setting.
+
+ Default: 1 (merging across nodes as in earlier releases)
+
+run
+ * set to 0 to stop ksmd from running but keep merged pages,
+ * set to 1 to run ksmd e.g. ``echo 1 > /sys/kernel/mm/ksm/run``,
+ * set to 2 to stop ksmd and unmerge all pages currently merged, but
+ leave mergeable areas registered for next run.
+
+ Default: 0 (must be changed to 1 to activate KSM, except if
+ CONFIG_SYSFS is disabled)
+
+use_zero_pages
+ specifies whether empty pages (i.e. allocated pages that only
+ contain zeroes) should be treated specially. When set to 1,
+ empty pages are merged with the kernel zero page(s) instead of
+ with each other as it would happen normally. This can improve
+ the performance on architectures with coloured zero pages,
+ depending on the workload. Care should be taken when enabling
+ this setting, as it can potentially degrade the performance of
+ KSM for some workloads, for example if the checksums of pages
+ candidate for merging match the checksum of an empty
+ page. This setting can be changed at any time, it is only
+ effective for pages merged after the change.
+
+ Default: 0 (normal KSM behaviour as in earlier releases)
+
+max_page_sharing
+ Maximum sharing allowed for each KSM page. This enforces a
+ deduplication limit to avoid high latency for virtual memory
+ operations that involve traversal of the virtual mappings that
+ share the KSM page. The minimum value is 2 as a newly created
+ KSM page will have at least two sharers. The higher this value
+ the faster KSM will merge the memory and the higher the
+ deduplication factor will be, but the slower the worst case
+ virtual mappings traversal could be for any given KSM
+ page. Slowing down this traversal means there will be higher
+ latency for certain virtual memory operations happening during
+ swapping, compaction, NUMA balancing and page migration, in
+ turn decreasing responsiveness for the caller of those virtual
+ memory operations. The scheduler latency of other tasks not
+ involved with the VM operations doing the virtual mappings
+ traversal is not affected by this parameter as these
+ traversals are always schedule friendly themselves.
+
+stable_node_chains_prune_millisecs
+ specifies how frequently KSM checks the metadata of the pages
+ that hit the deduplication limit for stale information.
+ Smaller milllisecs values will free up the KSM metadata with
+ lower latency, but they will make ksmd use more CPU during the
+ scan. It's a noop if not a single KSM page hit the
+ ``max_page_sharing`` yet.
+
+The effectiveness of KSM and MADV_MERGEABLE is shown in ``/sys/kernel/mm/ksm/``:
+
+pages_shared
+ how many shared pages are being used
+pages_sharing
+ how many more sites are sharing them i.e. how much saved
+pages_unshared
+ how many pages unique but repeatedly checked for merging
+pages_volatile
+ how many pages changing too fast to be placed in a tree
+full_scans
+ how many times all mergeable areas have been scanned
+stable_node_chains
+ the number of KSM pages that hit the ``max_page_sharing`` limit
+stable_node_dups
+ number of duplicated KSM pages
+
+A high ratio of ``pages_sharing`` to ``pages_shared`` indicates good
+sharing, but a high ratio of ``pages_unshared`` to ``pages_sharing``
+indicates wasted effort. ``pages_volatile`` embraces several
+different kinds of activity, but a high proportion there would also
+indicate poor use of madvise MADV_MERGEABLE.
+
+The maximum possible ``pages_sharing/pages_shared`` ratio is limited by the
+``max_page_sharing`` tunable. To increase the ratio ``max_page_sharing`` must
+be increased accordingly.
+
+--
+Izik Eidus,
+Hugh Dickins, 17 Nov 2009