*Georgi Nikolov*
System Administrator
www.icdsoft.com <http://www.icdsoft.com>

On 07/26/2018 11:48 AM, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
> On 07/26/2018 10:31 AM, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
>> On 07/26/2018 10:03 AM, Michal Hocko wrote:
>>> On Thu 26-07-18 09:50:45, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
>>>> On 07/26/2018 09:42 AM, Michal Hocko wrote:
>>>>> On Thu 26-07-18 09:34:58, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
>>>>>> On 07/26/2018 09:26 AM, Michal Hocko wrote:
>>>>>>> On Thu 26-07-18 09:18:57, Vlastimil Babka wrote:
>>>>>>>> On 07/25/2018 09:52 PM, Andrew Morton wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> This is likely the kvmalloc() in xt_alloc_table_info(). Between 4.13 and
>>>>>>>> 4.17 it shouldn't use __GFP_NORETRY, but looks like commit 0537250fdc6c
>>>>>>>> ("netfilter: x_tables: make allocation less aggressive") was backported
>>>>>>>> to 4.14. Removing __GFP_NORETRY might help here, but bring back other
>>>>>>>> issues. Less than 4MB is not that much though, maybe find some "sane"
>>>>>>>> limit and use __GFP_NORETRY only above that?
>>>>>>> I have seen the same report via http://lkml.kernel.org/r/df6f501c-8546-1f55-40b1-7e3a8f54d872@icdsoft.com
>>>>>>> and the reported confirmed that kvmalloc is not a real culprit
>>>>>>> http://lkml.kernel.org/r/d99a9598-808a-6968-4131-c3949b752004@icdsoft.com
>>>>>> Hmm but that was revert of eacd86ca3b03 ("net/netfilter/x_tables.c: use
>>>>>> kvmalloc() in xt_alloc_table_info()") which was the 4.13 commit that
>>>>>> removed __GFP_NORETRY (there's no __GFP_NORETRY under net/netfilter in
>>>>>> v4.14). I assume it was reverted on top of vanilla v4.14 as there would
>>>>>> be conflict on the stable with 0537250fdc6c backport. So what should be
>>>>>> tested to be sure is either vanilla v4.14 without stable backports, or
>>>>>> latest v4.14.y with revert of 0537250fdc6c.
>>>>> But 0537250fdc6c simply restored the previous NORETRY behavior from
>>>>> before eacd86ca3b03. So whatever causes these issues doesn't seem to be
>>>>> directly related to the kvmalloc change. Or do I miss what you are
>>>>> saying?
>>>> I'm saying that although it's not a regression, as you say (the
>>>> vmalloc() there was only for a few kernel versions called without
>>>> __GFP_NORETRY), it's still possible that removing __GFP_NORETRY will fix
>>>> the issue and thus we will rule out other possibilities.
>>> http://lkml.kernel.org/r/d99a9598-808a-6968-4131-c3949b752004@icdsoft.com
>>> claims that reverting eacd86ca3b03 didn't really help.
> Ah, I see, that mail thread references a different kernel bugzilla
> #200639 which doesn't mention 4.14, but outright blames commit
> eacd86ca3b03. Yet the alloc fail message contains __GFP_NORETRY, so I
> still suspect the kernel also had 0537250fdc6c backport. Georgi can you
> please clarify which exact kernel version had the alloc failures, and
> how exactly you tested the revert (which version was the baseline for
> revert). Thanks.
>
>> Of course not. eacd86ca3b03 *removed* __GFP_NORETRY, so the revert
>> reintroduced it. I tried to explain it in the quoted part above starting
>> with "Hmm but that was revert of eacd86ca3b03 ...". What I'm saying is
>> that eacd86ca3b03 might have actually *fixed* (or rather prevented) this
>> alloc failure, if there was not 0537250fdc6c and its 4.14 stable
>> backport (the kernel bugzilla report says 4.14, I'm assuming new enough
>> stable to contain 0537250fdc6c as the failure message contains
>> __GFP_NORETRY).
>>
>> The mail you reference also says "seems that old version is masking
>> errors", which confirms that we are indeed looking at the right
>> vmalloc(), because eacd86ca3b03 also removed __GFP_NOWARN there (and
>> thus the revert reintroduced it).
>>
>>

Hello,
Kernel that has allocation failures is 4.14.50.
Here is the patch applied to this version which masks errors:

--- net/netfilter/x_tables.c    2018-06-18 14:18:21.138347416 +0300
+++ net/netfilter/x_tables.c    2018-07-26 11:58:01.721932962 +0300
@@ -1059,9 +1059,19 @@
      * than shoot all processes down before realizing there is nothing
      * more to reclaim.
      */
-    info = kvmalloc(sz, GFP_KERNEL | __GFP_NORETRY);
+/*    info = kvmalloc(sz, GFP_KERNEL | __GFP_NORETRY);
     if (!info)
         return NULL;
+*/
+
+    if (sz <= (PAGE_SIZE << PAGE_ALLOC_COSTLY_ORDER))
+        info = kmalloc(sz, GFP_KERNEL | __GFP_NOWARN | __GFP_NORETRY);
+    if (!info) {
+        info = __vmalloc(sz, GFP_KERNEL | __GFP_NOWARN | __GFP_NORETRY,
+         PAGE_KERNEL);
+        if (!info)
+        return NULL;
+    }
 
     memset(info, 0, sizeof(*info));
     info->size = size;


I will try to reproduce it with only

info = kvmalloc(sz, GFP_KERNEL);

Regards,

--
Georgi Nikolov