Re: [PATCH 1/2] mm: slub: allocate slab object extensions non-contiguously

[Shakeel Butt <shakeel.butt@linux.dev>]

On Tue, May 20, 2025 at 10:01:27AM -0400, Kent Overstreet wrote:
> On Tue, May 20, 2025 at 02:46:14PM +0100, Usama Arif wrote:
> > 
> > 
> > On 20/05/2025 14:44, Kent Overstreet wrote:
> > > On Tue, May 20, 2025 at 01:25:46PM +0100, Usama Arif wrote:
> > >> When memory allocation profiling is running on memory bound services,
> > >> allocations greater than order 0 for slab object extensions can fail,
> > >> for e.g. zs_handle zswap slab which will be 512 objsperslab x 16 bytes
> > >> per slabobj_ext (order 1 allocation). Use kvcalloc to improve chances
> > >> of the allocation being successful.
> > >>
> > >> Signed-off-by: Usama Arif <usamaarif642@gmail.com>
> > >> Reported-by: Vlad Poenaru <vlad.wing@gmail.com>
> > >> Closes: https://lore.kernel.org/all/17fab2d6-5a74-4573-bcc3-b75951508f0a@gmail.com/
> > >> ---
> > >>  mm/slub.c | 2 +-
> > >>  1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
> > >>
> > >> diff --git a/mm/slub.c b/mm/slub.c
> > >> index dc9e729e1d26..bf43c403ead2 100644
> > >> --- a/mm/slub.c
> > >> +++ b/mm/slub.c
> > >> @@ -1989,7 +1989,7 @@ int alloc_slab_obj_exts(struct slab *slab, struct kmem_cache *s,
> > >>  	gfp &= ~OBJCGS_CLEAR_MASK;
> > >>  	/* Prevent recursive extension vector allocation */
> > >>  	gfp |= __GFP_NO_OBJ_EXT;
> > >> -	vec = kcalloc_node(objects, sizeof(struct slabobj_ext), gfp,
> > >> +	vec = kvcalloc_node(objects, sizeof(struct slabobj_ext), gfp,
> > >>  			   slab_nid(slab));
> > > 
> > > And what's the latency going to be on a vmalloc() allocation when we're
> > > low on memory?
> > 
> > Would it not be better to get the allocation slighly slower than to not get
> > it at all?
> 
> Our behaviour when thrashing sucks, we don't want to do anything to make
> that worse.
> 
> There's also the fact that vmalloc doesn't correctly respect gfp flags,
> so until that gets fixed this doesn't work at all.

Which gfp flags vmalloc is not respecting today?