Re: [RFC PATCH] mm/page_alloc: Add PCP list for THP CMA

[David Hildenbrand <david@redhat.com>]

On 04.08.25 20:20, Juan Yescas wrote:
> Hi David/Zi,
> 
> Is there any reason why the MIGRATE_CMA pages are not in the PCP lists?
> 
> There are many devices that need fast allocation of MIGRATE_CMA pages,
> and they have to get them from the buddy allocator, which is a bit
> slower in comparison to the PCP lists.
> 
> We also have cases where the MIGRATE_CMA memory requirements are big.
> For example, GPUs need MIGRATE_CMA memory in the ranges of 30MiB to 500MiBs.
> These cases would benefit if we have THPs for CMAs.
> 
> Could we add the support for MIGRATE_CMA pages on the PCP and THP lists?

Remember how CMA memory is used:

The owner allocates it through cma_alloc() and friends, where the CMA 
allocator will try allocating *specific physical memory regions* using 
alloc_contig_range(). It doesn't just go ahead and pick a random CMA 
page from the buddy (or PCP) lists. Doesn't work (just imagine having 
different CMA areas etc).

Anybody else is free to use CMA pages for MOVABLE allocations. So we 
treat them as being MOVABLE on the PCP.

Having a separate CMA PCP list doesn't solve or speedup anything, really.

I still have no clue what this patch here tried to solve: it doesn't 
make any sense.

-- 
Cheers,

David / dhildenb