No description
  • C 96.8%
  • Assembly 0.9%
  • Rust 0.7%
  • Shell 0.6%
  • Python 0.5%
  • Other 0.3%
Find a file
Leno Hou a6a8c087dc mm/mglru: fix cgroup OOM during MGLRU state switching
When the Multi-Gen LRU (MGLRU) state is toggled dynamically, a race
condition exists between the state switching and the memory reclaim path. 
This can lead to unexpected cgroup OOM kills, even when plenty of
reclaimable memory is available.

Problem Description
==================
The issue arises from a "reclaim vacuum" during the transition.

1. When disabling MGLRU, lru_gen_change_state() sets lrugen->enabled to
   false before the pages are drained from MGLRU lists back to traditional
   LRU lists.
2. Concurrent reclaimers in shrink_lruvec() see lrugen->enabled as false
   and skip the MGLRU path.
3. However, these pages might not have reached the traditional LRU lists
   yet, or the changes are not yet visible to all CPUs due to a lack
   of synchronization.
4. get_scan_count() subsequently finds traditional LRU lists empty,
   concludes there is no reclaimable memory, and triggers an OOM kill.

A similar race can occur during enablement, where the reclaimer sees the
new state but the MGLRU lists haven't been populated via fill_evictable()
yet.

Solution
========
Introduce a 'switching' state (`lru_switch`) to bridge the transition.
When transitioning, the system enters this intermediate state where
the reclaimer is forced to attempt both MGLRU and traditional reclaim
paths sequentially. This ensures that folios remain visible to at least
one reclaim mechanism until the transition is fully materialized across
all CPUs.

Race & Mitigation
================
A race window exists between checking the 'draining' state and performing
the actual list operations. For instance, a reclaimer might observe the
draining state as false just before it changes, leading to a suboptimal
reclaim path decision.

However, this impact is effectively mitigated by the kernel's reclaim
retry mechanism (e.g., in do_try_to_free_pages). If a reclaimer pass fails
to find eligible folios due to a state transition race, subsequent retries
in the loop will observe the updated state and correctly direct the scan
to the appropriate LRU lists. This ensures the transient inconsistency
does not escalate into a terminal OOM kill.

This effectively reduce the race window that previously triggered OOMs
under high memory pressure.

This fix has been verified on v7.0.0-rc1; dynamic toggling of MGLRU
functions correctly without triggering unexpected OOM kills.

Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20260319-b4-switch-mglru-v2-v5-1-8898491e5f17@gmail.com
Signed-off-by: Leno Hou <lenohou@gmail.com>
Acked-by: Yafang Shao <laoar.shao@gmail.com>
Reviewed-by: Barry Song <baohua@kernel.org>
Reviewed-by: Axel Rasmussen <axelrasmussen@google.com>
Cc: Yuanchu Xie <yuanchu@google.com>
Cc: Wei Xu <weixugc@google.com>
Cc: Jialing Wang <wjl.linux@gmail.com>
Cc: Yu Zhao <yuzhao@google.com>
Cc: Kairui Song <ryncsn@gmail.com>
Cc: Bingfang Guo <bfguo@icloud.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
History 2026-04-05 13:53:33 -07:00
arch mm: remove CONFIG_ARCH_ENABLE_MEMORY_HOTREMOVE 2026-04-05 13:53:33 -07:00
block block-7.0-20260305 2026-03-06 08:36:18 -08:00
certs Convert 'alloc_obj' family to use the new default GFP_KERNEL argument 2026-02-21 17:09:51 -08:00
crypto crypto: testmgr - Fix stale references to aes-generic 2026-03-03 11:57:15 -08:00
Documentation Docs/mm/damon/design: document DAMON actions when TRANSPARENT_HUGEPAGE is off 2026-04-05 13:53:31 -07:00
drivers zram: change scan_slots to return void 2026-04-05 13:53:30 -07:00
fs mm: reintroduce vma_desc_test() as a singular flag test 2026-04-05 13:53:19 -07:00
include mm/mglru: fix cgroup OOM during MGLRU state switching 2026-04-05 13:53:33 -07:00
init mm: introduce CONFIG_NUMA_MIGRATION and simplify CONFIG_MIGRATION 2026-04-05 13:53:33 -07:00
io_uring io_uring-7.0-20260320 2026-03-20 09:58:56 -07:00
ipc Convert 'alloc_obj' family to use the new default GFP_KERNEL argument 2026-02-21 17:09:51 -08:00
kernel kho: drop restriction on maximum page order 2026-04-05 13:53:24 -07:00
lib ubsan: turn off kmsan inside of ubsan instrumentation 2026-04-05 13:53:19 -07:00
LICENSES LICENSES: Add modern form of the LGPL-2.1 tags to the usage guide section 2025-10-22 07:58:19 +02:00
mm mm/mglru: fix cgroup OOM during MGLRU state switching 2026-04-05 13:53:33 -07:00
net mm: introduce a new page type for page pool in page type 2026-04-05 13:53:19 -07:00
rust mm: rename zap_page_range_single() to zap_vma_range() 2026-04-05 13:53:15 -07:00
samples drm-fixes for 7.0-rc4 2026-03-13 15:38:55 -07:00
scripts livepatch/klp-build: Fix inconsistent kernel version 2026-03-16 12:50:17 -07:00
security xen/privcmd: add boot control for restricted usage in domU 2026-03-20 12:06:01 +01:00
sound driver core: platform: use generic driver_override infrastructure 2026-03-17 20:30:57 +01:00
tools mm: abstract reading sysctl_max_map_count, and READ_ONCE() 2026-04-05 13:53:28 -07:00
usr kbuild: uapi: drop dependency on CC_CAN_LINK 2026-01-16 15:02:11 -07:00
virt KVM: remove hugetlb.h inclusion 2026-04-05 13:53:23 -07:00
.clang-format Devicetree updates for v7.0: 2026-02-11 18:27:08 -08:00
.clippy.toml rust: clean Rust 1.88.0's warning about clippy::disallowed_macros configuration 2025-05-07 00:11:47 +02:00
.cocciconfig scripts: add Linux .cocciconfig for coccinelle 2016-07-22 12:13:39 +02:00
.editorconfig editorconfig: add rst extension 2026-01-26 19:07:09 -08:00
.get_maintainer.ignore MAINTAINERS: remove Alyssa Rosenzweig 2025-09-18 21:17:31 +02:00
.gitattributes .gitattributes: set diff driver for Rust source code files 2023-05-31 17:48:25 +02:00
.gitignore rust: kbuild: add proc macro library support 2025-11-24 17:15:36 +01:00
.mailmap mailmap: update email address for Muhammad Usama Anjum 2026-03-23 09:35:05 -07:00
.pylintrc docs: Move the python libraries to tools/lib/python 2025-11-18 09:22:40 -07:00
.rustfmt.toml rust: add .rustfmt.toml 2022-09-28 09:02:20 +02:00
COPYING COPYING: state that all contributions really are covered by this file 2020-02-10 13:32:20 -08:00
CREDITS MAINTAINERS: remove Thomas Falcon from IBM ibmvnic 2026-03-05 07:35:45 -08:00
Kbuild sched: Make migrate_{en,dis}able() inline 2025-09-25 09:57:16 +02:00
Kconfig io_uring: Rename KConfig to Kconfig 2025-02-19 14:53:27 -07:00
MAINTAINERS MAINTAINERS: add mm-related procfs files to MM sections 2026-04-05 13:53:19 -07:00
Makefile Linux 7.0-rc5 2026-03-22 14:42:17 -07:00
README docs: add AI Coding Assistants documentation 2026-01-06 14:55:06 -07:00

Linux kernel
============

The Linux kernel is the core of any Linux operating system. It manages hardware,
system resources, and provides the fundamental services for all other software.

Quick Start
-----------

* Report a bug: See Documentation/admin-guide/reporting-issues.rst
* Get the latest kernel: https://kernel.org
* Build the kernel: See Documentation/admin-guide/quickly-build-trimmed-linux.rst
* Join the community: https://lore.kernel.org/

Essential Documentation
-----------------------

All users should be familiar with:

* Building requirements: Documentation/process/changes.rst
* Code of Conduct: Documentation/process/code-of-conduct.rst
* License: See COPYING

Documentation can be built with make htmldocs or viewed online at:
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/


Who Are You?
============

Find your role below:

* New Kernel Developer - Getting started with kernel development
* Academic Researcher - Studying kernel internals and architecture
* Security Expert - Hardening and vulnerability analysis
* Backport/Maintenance Engineer - Maintaining stable kernels
* System Administrator - Configuring and troubleshooting
* Maintainer - Leading subsystems and reviewing patches
* Hardware Vendor - Writing drivers for new hardware
* Distribution Maintainer - Packaging kernels for distros
* AI Coding Assistant - LLMs and AI-powered development tools


For Specific Users
==================

New Kernel Developer
--------------------

Welcome! Start your kernel development journey here:

* Getting Started: Documentation/process/development-process.rst
* Your First Patch: Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst
* Coding Style: Documentation/process/coding-style.rst
* Build System: Documentation/kbuild/index.rst
* Development Tools: Documentation/dev-tools/index.rst
* Kernel Hacking Guide: Documentation/kernel-hacking/hacking.rst
* Core APIs: Documentation/core-api/index.rst

Academic Researcher
-------------------

Explore the kernel's architecture and internals:

* Researcher Guidelines: Documentation/process/researcher-guidelines.rst
* Memory Management: Documentation/mm/index.rst
* Scheduler: Documentation/scheduler/index.rst
* Networking Stack: Documentation/networking/index.rst
* Filesystems: Documentation/filesystems/index.rst
* RCU (Read-Copy Update): Documentation/RCU/index.rst
* Locking Primitives: Documentation/locking/index.rst
* Power Management: Documentation/power/index.rst

Security Expert
---------------

Security documentation and hardening guides:

* Security Documentation: Documentation/security/index.rst
* LSM Development: Documentation/security/lsm-development.rst
* Self Protection: Documentation/security/self-protection.rst
* Reporting Vulnerabilities: Documentation/process/security-bugs.rst
* CVE Procedures: Documentation/process/cve.rst
* Embargoed Hardware Issues: Documentation/process/embargoed-hardware-issues.rst
* Security Features: Documentation/userspace-api/seccomp_filter.rst

Backport/Maintenance Engineer
-----------------------------

Maintain and stabilize kernel versions:

* Stable Kernel Rules: Documentation/process/stable-kernel-rules.rst
* Backporting Guide: Documentation/process/backporting.rst
* Applying Patches: Documentation/process/applying-patches.rst
* Subsystem Profile: Documentation/maintainer/maintainer-entry-profile.rst
* Git for Maintainers: Documentation/maintainer/configure-git.rst

System Administrator
--------------------

Configure, tune, and troubleshoot Linux systems:

* Admin Guide: Documentation/admin-guide/index.rst
* Kernel Parameters: Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.rst
* Sysctl Tuning: Documentation/admin-guide/sysctl/index.rst
* Tracing/Debugging: Documentation/trace/index.rst
* Performance Security: Documentation/admin-guide/perf-security.rst
* Hardware Monitoring: Documentation/hwmon/index.rst

Maintainer
----------

Lead kernel subsystems and manage contributions:

* Maintainer Handbook: Documentation/maintainer/index.rst
* Pull Requests: Documentation/maintainer/pull-requests.rst
* Managing Patches: Documentation/maintainer/modifying-patches.rst
* Rebasing and Merging: Documentation/maintainer/rebasing-and-merging.rst
* Development Process: Documentation/process/maintainer-handbooks.rst
* Maintainer Entry Profile: Documentation/maintainer/maintainer-entry-profile.rst
* Git Configuration: Documentation/maintainer/configure-git.rst

Hardware Vendor
---------------

Write drivers and support new hardware:

* Driver API Guide: Documentation/driver-api/index.rst
* Driver Model: Documentation/driver-api/driver-model/driver.rst
* Device Drivers: Documentation/driver-api/infrastructure.rst
* Bus Types: Documentation/driver-api/driver-model/bus.rst
* Device Tree Bindings: Documentation/devicetree/bindings/
* Power Management: Documentation/driver-api/pm/index.rst
* DMA API: Documentation/core-api/dma-api.rst

Distribution Maintainer
-----------------------

Package and distribute the kernel:

* Stable Kernel Rules: Documentation/process/stable-kernel-rules.rst
* ABI Documentation: Documentation/ABI/README
* Kernel Configuration: Documentation/kbuild/kconfig.rst
* Module Signing: Documentation/admin-guide/module-signing.rst
* Kernel Parameters: Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.rst
* Tainted Kernels: Documentation/admin-guide/tainted-kernels.rst

AI Coding Assistant
-------------------

CRITICAL: If you are an LLM or AI-powered coding assistant, you MUST read and
follow the AI coding assistants documentation before contributing to the Linux
kernel:

* Documentation/process/coding-assistants.rst

This documentation contains essential requirements about licensing, attribution,
and the Developer Certificate of Origin that all AI tools must comply with.


Communication and Support
=========================

* Mailing Lists: https://lore.kernel.org/
* IRC: #kernelnewbies on irc.oftc.net
* Bugzilla: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/
* MAINTAINERS file: Lists subsystem maintainers and mailing lists
* Email Clients: Documentation/process/email-clients.rst