Re: [Qemu-devel] [PATCH] os: don't corrupt pre-existing memory-backend data with prealloc

[Michal Privoznik]

On 02/23/2017 01:07 PM, Daniel P. Berrange wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 23, 2017 at 01:05:33PM +0100, Michal Privoznik wrote:
>> On 02/23/2017 11:59 AM, Daniel P. Berrange wrote:
>>> When using a memory-backend object with prealloc turned on, QEMU
>>> will memset() the first byte in every memory page to zero. While
>>> this might have been acceptable for memory backends associated
>>> with RAM, this corrupts application data for NVDIMMs.
>>>
>>> Instead of setting every page to zero, read the current byte
>>> value and then just write that same value back, so we are not
>>> corrupting the original data.
>>>
>>> Signed-off-by: Daniel P. Berrange <address@hidden>
>>> ---
>>>
>>> I'm unclear if this is actually still safe in practice ? Is the
>>> compiler permitted to optimize away the read+write since it doesn't
>>> change the memory value. I'd hope not, but I've been surprised
>>> before...
>>>
>>> IMHO this is another factor in favour of requesting an API from
>>> the kernel to provide the prealloc behaviour we want.
>>>
>>>  util/oslib-posix.c | 3 ++-
>>>  1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>>>
>>> diff --git a/util/oslib-posix.c b/util/oslib-posix.c
>>> index 35012b9..8f5b656 100644
>>> --- a/util/oslib-posix.c
>>> +++ b/util/oslib-posix.c
>>> @@ -355,7 +355,8 @@ void os_mem_prealloc(int fd, char *area, size_t memory, 
>>> Error **errp)
>>>  
>>>          /* MAP_POPULATE silently ignores failures */
>>>          for (i = 0; i < numpages; i++) {
>>> -            memset(area + (hpagesize * i), 0, 1);
>>> +            char val = *(area + (hpagesize * i));
>>> +            memset(area + (hpagesize * i), 0, val);
>>
>> I think you wanted:
>>
>> memset(area + (hpagesize * i), val, 1);
>>
>> because what you are suggesting will overwrite even more than the first
>> byte with zeroes.
> 
> Lol, yes, I'm stupid.
> 
> Anyway, rather than repost this yet, I'm interested if this is actually
> the right way to fix the problem or if we should do something totally
> different....

So, I've done some analysis and if the optimizations are enabled, this
whole body is optimized away. Not the loop though. Here's what I've tested:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <string.h>

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
    int ret = EXIT_FAILURE;
    unsigned char *ptr;
    size_t i, j;

    if (!(ptr = malloc(1024 * 4))) {
        perror("malloc");
        goto cleanup;
    }

    for (i = 0; i < 4; i++) {
        unsigned char val = ptr[i*1024];
        memset(ptr + i * 1024, val, 1);
    }

    ret = EXIT_SUCCESS;
 cleanup:
    free(ptr);
    return ret;
}


But if I make @val volatile, I can enforce the compiler to include the
body of the loop and actually read and write some bytes. BTW: if I
replace memset with *(ptr + i * 1024) = val; and don't make @val
volatile even the loop is optimized away.

I was compiling with:

gcc -S -O3 -o test.S test.c

Michal