Re: [PATCH] mm/alloc_tag: clear codetag for pages allocated before page_ext initialization

Andrew Morton
2026-03-19T22:28:14Z

On Thu, 19 Mar 2026 16:31:53 +0800 Hao Ge <hao.ge@linux.dev> wrote:

> Due to initialization ordering, page_ext is allocated and initialized
> relatively late during boot. Some pages have already been allocated
> and freed before page_ext becomes available, leaving their codetag
> uninitialized.
>
> A clear example is in init_section_page_ext(): alloc_page_ext() calls
> kmemleak_alloc(). If the slab cache has no free objects, it falls back
> to the buddy allocator to allocate memory. However, at this point page_ext
> is not yet fully initialized, so these newly allocated pages have no
> codetag set. These pages may later be reclaimed by KASAN,which causes
> the warning to trigger when they are freed because their codetag ref is
> still empty.
>
> Use a global array to track pages allocated before page_ext is fully
> initialized, similar to how kmemleak tracks early allocations.
> When page_ext initialization completes, set their codetag
> to empty to avoid warnings when they are freed later.
>
> ...
>
> --- a/include/linux/alloc_tag.h
> +++ b/include/linux/alloc_tag.h
> @@ -74,6 +74,9 @@ static inline void set_codetag_empty(union codetag_ref *ref)
>
> #ifdef CONFIG_MEM_ALLOC_PROFILING
>
> +bool mem_profiling_is_available(void);
> +void alloc_tag_add_early_pfn(unsigned long pfn);
> +
> #define ALLOC_TAG_SECTION_NAME "alloc_tags"
>
> struct codetag_bytes {
> diff --git a/lib/alloc_tag.c b/lib/alloc_tag.c
> index 58991ab09d84..a5bf4e72c154 100644
> --- a/lib/alloc_tag.c
> +++ b/lib/alloc_tag.c
> @@ -6,6 +6,7 @@
> #include <linux/kallsyms.h>
> #include <linux/module.h>
> #include <linux/page_ext.h>
> +#include <linux/pgalloc_tag.h>
> #include <linux/proc_fs.h>
> #include <linux/seq_buf.h>
> #include <linux/seq_file.h>
> @@ -26,6 +27,82 @@ static bool mem_profiling_support;
>
> static struct codetag_type *alloc_tag_cttype;
>
> +/*
> + * State of the alloc_tag
> + *
> + * This is used to describe the states of the alloc_tag during bootup.
> + *
> + * When we need to allocate page_ext to store codetag, we face an
> + * initialization timing problem:
> + *
> + * Due to initialization order, pages may be allocated via buddy system
> + * before page_ext is fully allocated and initialized. Although these
> + * pages call the allocation hooks, the codetag will not be set because
> + * page_ext is not yet available.
> + *
> + * When these pages are later free to the buddy system, it triggers
> + * warnings because their codetag is actually empty if
> + * CONFIG_MEM_ALLOC_PROFILING_DEBUG is enabled.
> + *
> + * Additionally, in this situation, we cannot record detailed allocation
> + * information for these pages.
> + */
> +enum mem_profiling_state {
> + DOWN, /* No mem_profiling functionality yet */
> + UP /* Everything is working */
> +};
> +
> +static enum mem_profiling_state mem_profiling_state = DOWN;
> +
> +bool mem_profiling_is_available(void)
> +{
> + return mem_profiling_state == UP;
> +}
> +
> +#ifdef CONFIG_MEM_ALLOC_PROFILING_DEBUG
> +
> +#define EARLY_ALLOC_PFN_MAX 256
> +
> +static unsigned long early_pfns[EARLY_ALLOC_PFN_MAX];

It's unfortunate that this isn't __initdata.

> +static unsigned int early_pfn_count;
> +static DEFINE_SPINLOCK(early_pfn_lock);
> +
>
> ...
>
> --- a/mm/page_alloc.c
> +++ b/mm/page_alloc.c
> @@ -1293,6 +1293,13 @@ void __pgalloc_tag_add(struct page *page, struct task_struct *task,
> alloc_tag_add(&ref, task->alloc_tag, PAGE_SIZE * nr);
> update_page_tag_ref(handle, &ref);
> put_page_tag_ref(handle);
> + } else {
> + /*
> + * page_ext is not available yet, record the pfn so we can
> + * clear the tag ref later when page_ext is initialized.
> + */
> + if (!mem_profiling_is_available())
> + alloc_tag_add_early_pfn(page_to_pfn(page));
> }
> }

All because of this, I believe. Is this fixable?

If we take that `else', we know we're running in __init code, yes? I
don't see how `__init pgalloc_tag_add_early()' could be made to work.
hrm. Something clever, please.