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authorLibravatar Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>2023-02-21 18:24:12 -0800
committerLibravatar Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>2023-02-21 18:24:12 -0800
commit5b7c4cabbb65f5c469464da6c5f614cbd7f730f2 (patch)
treecc5c2d0a898769fd59549594fedb3ee6f84e59a0 /Documentation/admin-guide/cgroup-v1/memory.rst
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Merge tag 'net-next-6.3' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/netdev/net-nextgrafted
Pull networking updates from Jakub Kicinski: "Core: - Add dedicated kmem_cache for typical/small skb->head, avoid having to access struct page at kfree time, and improve memory use. - Introduce sysctl to set default RPS configuration for new netdevs. - Define Netlink protocol specification format which can be used to describe messages used by each family and auto-generate parsers. Add tools for generating kernel data structures and uAPI headers. - Expose all net/core sysctls inside netns. - Remove 4s sleep in netpoll if carrier is instantly detected on boot. - Add configurable limit of MDB entries per port, and port-vlan. - Continue populating drop reasons throughout the stack. - Retire a handful of legacy Qdiscs and classifiers. Protocols: - Support IPv4 big TCP (TSO frames larger than 64kB). - Add IP_LOCAL_PORT_RANGE socket option, to control local port range on socket by socket basis. - Track and report in procfs number of MPTCP sockets used. - Support mixing IPv4 and IPv6 flows in the in-kernel MPTCP path manager. - IPv6: don't check net.ipv6.route.max_size and rely on garbage collection to free memory (similarly to IPv4). - Support Penultimate Segment Pop (PSP) flavor in SRv6 (RFC8986). - ICMP: add per-rate limit counters. - Add support for user scanning requests in ieee802154. - Remove static WEP support. - Support minimal Wi-Fi 7 Extremely High Throughput (EHT) rate reporting. - WiFi 7 EHT channel puncturing support (client & AP). BPF: - Add a rbtree data structure following the "next-gen data structure" precedent set by recently added linked list, that is, by using kfunc + kptr instead of adding a new BPF map type. - Expose XDP hints via kfuncs with initial support for RX hash and timestamp metadata. - Add BPF_F_NO_TUNNEL_KEY extension to bpf_skb_set_tunnel_key to better support decap on GRE tunnel devices not operating in collect metadata. - Improve x86 JIT's codegen for PROBE_MEM runtime error checks. - Remove the need for trace_printk_lock for bpf_trace_printk and bpf_trace_vprintk helpers. - Extend libbpf's bpf_tracing.h support for tracing arguments of kprobes/uprobes and syscall as a special case. - Significantly reduce the search time for module symbols by livepatch and BPF. - Enable cpumasks to be used as kptrs, which is useful for tracing programs tracking which tasks end up running on which CPUs in different time intervals. - Add support for BPF trampoline on s390x and riscv64. - Add capability to export the XDP features supported by the NIC. - Add __bpf_kfunc tag for marking kernel functions as kfuncs. - Add cgroup.memory=nobpf kernel parameter option to disable BPF memory accounting for container environments. Netfilter: - Remove the CLUSTERIP target. It has been marked as obsolete for years, and we still have WARN splats wrt races of the out-of-band /proc interface installed by this target. - Add 'destroy' commands to nf_tables. They are identical to the existing 'delete' commands, but do not return an error if the referenced object (set, chain, rule...) did not exist. Driver API: - Improve cpumask_local_spread() locality to help NICs set the right IRQ affinity on AMD platforms. - Separate C22 and C45 MDIO bus transactions more clearly. - Introduce new DCB table to control DSCP rewrite on egress. - Support configuration of Physical Layer Collision Avoidance (PLCA) Reconciliation Sublayer (RS) (802.3cg-2019). Modern version of shared medium Ethernet. - Support for MAC Merge layer (IEEE 802.3-2018 clause 99). Allowing preemption of low priority frames by high priority frames. - Add support for controlling MACSec offload using netlink SET. - Rework devlink instance refcounts to allow registration and de-registration under the instance lock. Split the code into multiple files, drop some of the unnecessarily granular locks and factor out common parts of netlink operation handling. - Add TX frame aggregation parameters (for USB drivers). - Add a new attr TCA_EXT_WARN_MSG to report TC (offload) warning messages with notifications for debug. - Allow offloading of UDP NEW connections via act_ct. - Add support for per action HW stats in TC. - Support hardware miss to TC action (continue processing in SW from a specific point in the action chain). - Warn if old Wireless Extension user space interface is used with modern cfg80211/mac80211 drivers. Do not support Wireless Extensions for Wi-Fi 7 devices at all. Everyone should switch to using nl80211 interface instead. - Improve the CAN bit timing configuration. Use extack to return error messages directly to user space, update the SJW handling, including the definition of a new default value that will benefit CAN-FD controllers, by increasing their oscillator tolerance. New hardware / drivers: - Ethernet: - nVidia BlueField-3 support (control traffic driver) - Ethernet support for imx93 SoCs - Motorcomm yt8531 gigabit Ethernet PHY - onsemi NCN26000 10BASE-T1S PHY (with support for PLCA) - Microchip LAN8841 PHY (incl. cable diagnostics and PTP) - Amlogic gxl MDIO mux - WiFi: - RealTek RTL8188EU (rtl8xxxu) - Qualcomm Wi-Fi 7 devices (ath12k) - CAN: - Renesas R-Car V4H Drivers: - Bluetooth: - Set Per Platform Antenna Gain (PPAG) for Intel controllers. - Ethernet NICs: - Intel (1G, igc): - support TSN / Qbv / packet scheduling features of i226 model - Intel (100G, ice): - use GNSS subsystem instead of TTY - multi-buffer XDP support - extend support for GPIO pins to E823 devices - nVidia/Mellanox: - update the shared buffer configuration on PFC commands - implement PTP adjphase function for HW offset control - TC support for Geneve and GRE with VF tunnel offload - more efficient crypto key management method - multi-port eswitch support - Netronome/Corigine: - add DCB IEEE support - support IPsec offloading for NFP3800 - Freescale/NXP (enetc): - support XDP_REDIRECT for XDP non-linear buffers - improve reconfig, avoid link flap and waiting for idle - support MAC Merge layer - Other NICs: - sfc/ef100: add basic devlink support for ef100 - ionic: rx_push mode operation (writing descriptors via MMIO) - bnxt: use the auxiliary bus abstraction for RDMA - r8169: disable ASPM and reset bus in case of tx timeout - cpsw: support QSGMII mode for J721e CPSW9G - cpts: support pulse-per-second output - ngbe: add an mdio bus driver - usbnet: optimize usbnet_bh() by avoiding unnecessary queuing - r8152: handle devices with FW with NCM support - amd-xgbe: support 10Mbps, 2.5GbE speeds and rx-adaptation - virtio-net: support multi buffer XDP - virtio/vsock: replace virtio_vsock_pkt with sk_buff - tsnep: XDP support - Ethernet high-speed switches: - nVidia/Mellanox (mlxsw): - add support for latency TLV (in FW control messages) - Microchip (sparx5): - separate explicit and implicit traffic forwarding rules, make the implicit rules always active - add support for egress DSCP rewrite - IS0 VCAP support (Ingress Classification) - IS2 VCAP filters (protos, L3 addrs, L4 ports, flags, ToS etc.) - ES2 VCAP support (Egress Access Control) - support for Per-Stream Filtering and Policing (802.1Q, 8.6.5.1) - Ethernet embedded switches: - Marvell (mv88e6xxx): - add MAB (port auth) offload support - enable PTP receive for mv88e6390 - NXP (ocelot): - support MAC Merge layer - support for the the vsc7512 internal copper phys - Microchip: - lan9303: convert to PHYLINK - lan966x: support TC flower filter statistics - lan937x: PTP support for KSZ9563/KSZ8563 and LAN937x - lan937x: support Credit Based Shaper configuration - ksz9477: support Energy Efficient Ethernet - other: - qca8k: convert to regmap read/write API, use bulk operations - rswitch: Improve TX timestamp accuracy - Intel WiFi (iwlwifi): - EHT (Wi-Fi 7) rate reporting - STEP equalizer support: transfer some STEP (connection to radio on platforms with integrated wifi) related parameters from the BIOS to the firmware. - Qualcomm 802.11ax WiFi (ath11k): - IPQ5018 support - Fine Timing Measurement (FTM) responder role support - channel 177 support - MediaTek WiFi (mt76): - per-PHY LED support - mt7996: EHT (Wi-Fi 7) support - Wireless Ethernet Dispatch (WED) reset support - switch to using page pool allocator - RealTek WiFi (rtw89): - support new version of Bluetooth co-existance - Mobile: - rmnet: support TX aggregation" * tag 'net-next-6.3' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/netdev/net-next: (1872 commits) page_pool: add a comment explaining the fragment counter usage net: ethtool: fix __ethtool_dev_mm_supported() implementation ethtool: pse-pd: Fix double word in comments xsk: add linux/vmalloc.h to xsk.c sefltests: netdevsim: wait for devlink instance after netns removal selftest: fib_tests: Always cleanup before exit net/mlx5e: Align IPsec ASO result memory to be as required by hardware net/mlx5e: TC, Set CT miss to the specific ct action instance net/mlx5e: Rename CHAIN_TO_REG to MAPPED_OBJ_TO_REG net/mlx5: Refactor tc miss handling to a single function net/mlx5: Kconfig: Make tc offload depend on tc skb extension net/sched: flower: Support hardware miss to tc action net/sched: flower: Move filter handle initialization earlier net/sched: cls_api: Support hardware miss to tc action net/sched: Rename user cookie and act cookie sfc: fix builds without CONFIG_RTC_LIB sfc: clean up some inconsistent indentings net/mlx4_en: Introduce flexible array to silence overflow warning net: lan966x: Fix possible deadlock inside PTP net/ulp: Remove redundant ->clone() test in inet_clone_ulp(). ...
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+==========================
+Memory Resource Controller
+==========================
+
+.. caution::
+ This document is hopelessly outdated and it asks for a complete
+ rewrite. It still contains a useful information so we are keeping it
+ here but make sure to check the current code if you need a deeper
+ understanding.
+
+.. note::
+ The Memory Resource Controller has generically been referred to as the
+ memory controller in this document. Do not confuse memory controller
+ used here with the memory controller that is used in hardware.
+
+.. hint::
+ When we mention a cgroup (cgroupfs's directory) with memory controller,
+ we call it "memory cgroup". When you see git-log and source code, you'll
+ see patch's title and function names tend to use "memcg".
+ In this document, we avoid using it.
+
+Benefits and Purpose of the memory controller
+=============================================
+
+The memory controller isolates the memory behaviour of a group of tasks
+from the rest of the system. The article on LWN [12]_ mentions some probable
+uses of the memory controller. The memory controller can be used to
+
+a. Isolate an application or a group of applications
+ Memory-hungry applications can be isolated and limited to a smaller
+ amount of memory.
+b. Create a cgroup with a limited amount of memory; this can be used
+ as a good alternative to booting with mem=XXXX.
+c. Virtualization solutions can control the amount of memory they want
+ to assign to a virtual machine instance.
+d. A CD/DVD burner could control the amount of memory used by the
+ rest of the system to ensure that burning does not fail due to lack
+ of available memory.
+e. There are several other use cases; find one or use the controller just
+ for fun (to learn and hack on the VM subsystem).
+
+Current Status: linux-2.6.34-mmotm(development version of 2010/April)
+
+Features:
+
+ - accounting anonymous pages, file caches, swap caches usage and limiting them.
+ - pages are linked to per-memcg LRU exclusively, and there is no global LRU.
+ - optionally, memory+swap usage can be accounted and limited.
+ - hierarchical accounting
+ - soft limit
+ - moving (recharging) account at moving a task is selectable.
+ - usage threshold notifier
+ - memory pressure notifier
+ - oom-killer disable knob and oom-notifier
+ - Root cgroup has no limit controls.
+
+ Kernel memory support is a work in progress, and the current version provides
+ basically functionality. (See :ref:`section 2.7
+ <cgroup-v1-memory-kernel-extension>`)
+
+Brief summary of control files.
+
+==================================== ==========================================
+ tasks attach a task(thread) and show list of
+ threads
+ cgroup.procs show list of processes
+ cgroup.event_control an interface for event_fd()
+ This knob is not available on CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT systems.
+ memory.usage_in_bytes show current usage for memory
+ (See 5.5 for details)
+ memory.memsw.usage_in_bytes show current usage for memory+Swap
+ (See 5.5 for details)
+ memory.limit_in_bytes set/show limit of memory usage
+ memory.memsw.limit_in_bytes set/show limit of memory+Swap usage
+ memory.failcnt show the number of memory usage hits limits
+ memory.memsw.failcnt show the number of memory+Swap hits limits
+ memory.max_usage_in_bytes show max memory usage recorded
+ memory.memsw.max_usage_in_bytes show max memory+Swap usage recorded
+ memory.soft_limit_in_bytes set/show soft limit of memory usage
+ This knob is not available on CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT systems.
+ memory.stat show various statistics
+ memory.use_hierarchy set/show hierarchical account enabled
+ This knob is deprecated and shouldn't be
+ used.
+ memory.force_empty trigger forced page reclaim
+ memory.pressure_level set memory pressure notifications
+ memory.swappiness set/show swappiness parameter of vmscan
+ (See sysctl's vm.swappiness)
+ memory.move_charge_at_immigrate set/show controls of moving charges
+ memory.oom_control set/show oom controls.
+ memory.numa_stat show the number of memory usage per numa
+ node
+ memory.kmem.limit_in_bytes This knob is deprecated and writing to
+ it will return -ENOTSUPP.
+ memory.kmem.usage_in_bytes show current kernel memory allocation
+ memory.kmem.failcnt show the number of kernel memory usage
+ hits limits
+ memory.kmem.max_usage_in_bytes show max kernel memory usage recorded
+
+ memory.kmem.tcp.limit_in_bytes set/show hard limit for tcp buf memory
+ memory.kmem.tcp.usage_in_bytes show current tcp buf memory allocation
+ memory.kmem.tcp.failcnt show the number of tcp buf memory usage
+ hits limits
+ memory.kmem.tcp.max_usage_in_bytes show max tcp buf memory usage recorded
+==================================== ==========================================
+
+1. History
+==========
+
+The memory controller has a long history. A request for comments for the memory
+controller was posted by Balbir Singh [1]_. At the time the RFC was posted
+there were several implementations for memory control. The goal of the
+RFC was to build consensus and agreement for the minimal features required
+for memory control. The first RSS controller was posted by Balbir Singh [2]_
+in Feb 2007. Pavel Emelianov [3]_ [4]_ [5]_ has since posted three versions
+of the RSS controller. At OLS, at the resource management BoF, everyone
+suggested that we handle both page cache and RSS together. Another request was
+raised to allow user space handling of OOM. The current memory controller is
+at version 6; it combines both mapped (RSS) and unmapped Page
+Cache Control [11]_.
+
+2. Memory Control
+=================
+
+Memory is a unique resource in the sense that it is present in a limited
+amount. If a task requires a lot of CPU processing, the task can spread
+its processing over a period of hours, days, months or years, but with
+memory, the same physical memory needs to be reused to accomplish the task.
+
+The memory controller implementation has been divided into phases. These
+are:
+
+1. Memory controller
+2. mlock(2) controller
+3. Kernel user memory accounting and slab control
+4. user mappings length controller
+
+The memory controller is the first controller developed.
+
+2.1. Design
+-----------
+
+The core of the design is a counter called the page_counter. The
+page_counter tracks the current memory usage and limit of the group of
+processes associated with the controller. Each cgroup has a memory controller
+specific data structure (mem_cgroup) associated with it.
+
+2.2. Accounting
+---------------
+
+.. code-block::
+ :caption: Figure 1: Hierarchy of Accounting
+
+ +--------------------+
+ | mem_cgroup |
+ | (page_counter) |
+ +--------------------+
+ / ^ \
+ / | \
+ +---------------+ | +---------------+
+ | mm_struct | |.... | mm_struct |
+ | | | | |
+ +---------------+ | +---------------+
+ |
+ + --------------+
+ |
+ +---------------+ +------+--------+
+ | page +----------> page_cgroup|
+ | | | |
+ +---------------+ +---------------+
+
+
+
+Figure 1 shows the important aspects of the controller
+
+1. Accounting happens per cgroup
+2. Each mm_struct knows about which cgroup it belongs to
+3. Each page has a pointer to the page_cgroup, which in turn knows the
+ cgroup it belongs to
+
+The accounting is done as follows: mem_cgroup_charge_common() is invoked to
+set up the necessary data structures and check if the cgroup that is being
+charged is over its limit. If it is, then reclaim is invoked on the cgroup.
+More details can be found in the reclaim section of this document.
+If everything goes well, a page meta-data-structure called page_cgroup is
+updated. page_cgroup has its own LRU on cgroup.
+(*) page_cgroup structure is allocated at boot/memory-hotplug time.
+
+2.2.1 Accounting details
+------------------------
+
+All mapped anon pages (RSS) and cache pages (Page Cache) are accounted.
+Some pages which are never reclaimable and will not be on the LRU
+are not accounted. We just account pages under usual VM management.
+
+RSS pages are accounted at page_fault unless they've already been accounted
+for earlier. A file page will be accounted for as Page Cache when it's
+inserted into inode (radix-tree). While it's mapped into the page tables of
+processes, duplicate accounting is carefully avoided.
+
+An RSS page is unaccounted when it's fully unmapped. A PageCache page is
+unaccounted when it's removed from radix-tree. Even if RSS pages are fully
+unmapped (by kswapd), they may exist as SwapCache in the system until they
+are really freed. Such SwapCaches are also accounted.
+A swapped-in page is accounted after adding into swapcache.
+
+Note: The kernel does swapin-readahead and reads multiple swaps at once.
+Since page's memcg recorded into swap whatever memsw enabled, the page will
+be accounted after swapin.
+
+At page migration, accounting information is kept.
+
+Note: we just account pages-on-LRU because our purpose is to control amount
+of used pages; not-on-LRU pages tend to be out-of-control from VM view.
+
+2.3 Shared Page Accounting
+--------------------------
+
+Shared pages are accounted on the basis of the first touch approach. The
+cgroup that first touches a page is accounted for the page. The principle
+behind this approach is that a cgroup that aggressively uses a shared
+page will eventually get charged for it (once it is uncharged from
+the cgroup that brought it in -- this will happen on memory pressure).
+
+But see :ref:`section 8.2 <cgroup-v1-memory-movable-charges>` when moving a
+task to another cgroup, its pages may be recharged to the new cgroup, if
+move_charge_at_immigrate has been chosen.
+
+2.4 Swap Extension
+--------------------------------------
+
+Swap usage is always recorded for each of cgroup. Swap Extension allows you to
+read and limit it.
+
+When CONFIG_SWAP is enabled, following files are added.
+
+ - memory.memsw.usage_in_bytes.
+ - memory.memsw.limit_in_bytes.
+
+memsw means memory+swap. Usage of memory+swap is limited by
+memsw.limit_in_bytes.
+
+Example: Assume a system with 4G of swap. A task which allocates 6G of memory
+(by mistake) under 2G memory limitation will use all swap.
+In this case, setting memsw.limit_in_bytes=3G will prevent bad use of swap.
+By using the memsw limit, you can avoid system OOM which can be caused by swap
+shortage.
+
+2.4.1 why 'memory+swap' rather than swap
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+The global LRU(kswapd) can swap out arbitrary pages. Swap-out means
+to move account from memory to swap...there is no change in usage of
+memory+swap. In other words, when we want to limit the usage of swap without
+affecting global LRU, memory+swap limit is better than just limiting swap from
+an OS point of view.
+
+2.4.2. What happens when a cgroup hits memory.memsw.limit_in_bytes
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+When a cgroup hits memory.memsw.limit_in_bytes, it's useless to do swap-out
+in this cgroup. Then, swap-out will not be done by cgroup routine and file
+caches are dropped. But as mentioned above, global LRU can do swapout memory
+from it for sanity of the system's memory management state. You can't forbid
+it by cgroup.
+
+2.5 Reclaim
+-----------
+
+Each cgroup maintains a per cgroup LRU which has the same structure as
+global VM. When a cgroup goes over its limit, we first try
+to reclaim memory from the cgroup so as to make space for the new
+pages that the cgroup has touched. If the reclaim is unsuccessful,
+an OOM routine is invoked to select and kill the bulkiest task in the
+cgroup. (See :ref:`10. OOM Control <cgroup-v1-memory-oom-control>` below.)
+
+The reclaim algorithm has not been modified for cgroups, except that
+pages that are selected for reclaiming come from the per-cgroup LRU
+list.
+
+.. note::
+ Reclaim does not work for the root cgroup, since we cannot set any
+ limits on the root cgroup.
+
+.. note::
+ When panic_on_oom is set to "2", the whole system will panic.
+
+When oom event notifier is registered, event will be delivered.
+(See :ref:`oom_control <cgroup-v1-memory-oom-control>` section)
+
+2.6 Locking
+-----------
+
+Lock order is as follows::
+
+ Page lock (PG_locked bit of page->flags)
+ mm->page_table_lock or split pte_lock
+ lock_page_memcg (memcg->move_lock)
+ mapping->i_pages lock
+ lruvec->lru_lock.
+
+Per-node-per-memcgroup LRU (cgroup's private LRU) is guarded by
+lruvec->lru_lock; PG_lru bit of page->flags is cleared before
+isolating a page from its LRU under lruvec->lru_lock.
+
+.. _cgroup-v1-memory-kernel-extension:
+
+2.7 Kernel Memory Extension
+-----------------------------------------------
+
+With the Kernel memory extension, the Memory Controller is able to limit
+the amount of kernel memory used by the system. Kernel memory is fundamentally
+different than user memory, since it can't be swapped out, which makes it
+possible to DoS the system by consuming too much of this precious resource.
+
+Kernel memory accounting is enabled for all memory cgroups by default. But
+it can be disabled system-wide by passing cgroup.memory=nokmem to the kernel
+at boot time. In this case, kernel memory will not be accounted at all.
+
+Kernel memory limits are not imposed for the root cgroup. Usage for the root
+cgroup may or may not be accounted. The memory used is accumulated into
+memory.kmem.usage_in_bytes, or in a separate counter when it makes sense.
+(currently only for tcp).
+
+The main "kmem" counter is fed into the main counter, so kmem charges will
+also be visible from the user counter.
+
+Currently no soft limit is implemented for kernel memory. It is future work
+to trigger slab reclaim when those limits are reached.
+
+2.7.1 Current Kernel Memory resources accounted
+-----------------------------------------------
+
+stack pages:
+ every process consumes some stack pages. By accounting into
+ kernel memory, we prevent new processes from being created when the kernel
+ memory usage is too high.
+
+slab pages:
+ pages allocated by the SLAB or SLUB allocator are tracked. A copy
+ of each kmem_cache is created every time the cache is touched by the first time
+ from inside the memcg. The creation is done lazily, so some objects can still be
+ skipped while the cache is being created. All objects in a slab page should
+ belong to the same memcg. This only fails to hold when a task is migrated to a
+ different memcg during the page allocation by the cache.
+
+sockets memory pressure:
+ some sockets protocols have memory pressure
+ thresholds. The Memory Controller allows them to be controlled individually
+ per cgroup, instead of globally.
+
+tcp memory pressure:
+ sockets memory pressure for the tcp protocol.
+
+2.7.2 Common use cases
+----------------------
+
+Because the "kmem" counter is fed to the main user counter, kernel memory can
+never be limited completely independently of user memory. Say "U" is the user
+limit, and "K" the kernel limit. There are three possible ways limits can be
+set:
+
+U != 0, K = unlimited:
+ This is the standard memcg limitation mechanism already present before kmem
+ accounting. Kernel memory is completely ignored.
+
+U != 0, K < U:
+ Kernel memory is a subset of the user memory. This setup is useful in
+ deployments where the total amount of memory per-cgroup is overcommitted.
+ Overcommitting kernel memory limits is definitely not recommended, since the
+ box can still run out of non-reclaimable memory.
+ In this case, the admin could set up K so that the sum of all groups is
+ never greater than the total memory, and freely set U at the cost of his
+ QoS.
+
+ .. warning::
+ In the current implementation, memory reclaim will NOT be triggered for
+ a cgroup when it hits K while staying below U, which makes this setup
+ impractical.
+
+U != 0, K >= U:
+ Since kmem charges will also be fed to the user counter and reclaim will be
+ triggered for the cgroup for both kinds of memory. This setup gives the
+ admin a unified view of memory, and it is also useful for people who just
+ want to track kernel memory usage.
+
+3. User Interface
+=================
+
+To use the user interface:
+
+1. Enable CONFIG_CGROUPS and CONFIG_MEMCG options
+2. Prepare the cgroups (see :ref:`Why are cgroups needed?
+ <cgroups-why-needed>` for the background information)::
+
+ # mount -t tmpfs none /sys/fs/cgroup
+ # mkdir /sys/fs/cgroup/memory
+ # mount -t cgroup none /sys/fs/cgroup/memory -o memory
+
+3. Make the new group and move bash into it::
+
+ # mkdir /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/0
+ # echo $$ > /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/0/tasks
+
+4. Since now we're in the 0 cgroup, we can alter the memory limit::
+
+ # echo 4M > /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/0/memory.limit_in_bytes
+
+ The limit can now be queried::
+
+ # cat /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/0/memory.limit_in_bytes
+ 4194304
+
+.. note::
+ We can use a suffix (k, K, m, M, g or G) to indicate values in kilo,
+ mega or gigabytes. (Here, Kilo, Mega, Giga are Kibibytes, Mebibytes,
+ Gibibytes.)
+
+.. note::
+ We can write "-1" to reset the ``*.limit_in_bytes(unlimited)``.
+
+.. note::
+ We cannot set limits on the root cgroup any more.
+
+
+We can check the usage::
+
+ # cat /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/0/memory.usage_in_bytes
+ 1216512
+
+A successful write to this file does not guarantee a successful setting of
+this limit to the value written into the file. This can be due to a
+number of factors, such as rounding up to page boundaries or the total
+availability of memory on the system. The user is required to re-read
+this file after a write to guarantee the value committed by the kernel::
+
+ # echo 1 > memory.limit_in_bytes
+ # cat memory.limit_in_bytes
+ 4096
+
+The memory.failcnt field gives the number of times that the cgroup limit was
+exceeded.
+
+The memory.stat file gives accounting information. Now, the number of
+caches, RSS and Active pages/Inactive pages are shown.
+
+4. Testing
+==========
+
+For testing features and implementation, see memcg_test.txt.
+
+Performance test is also important. To see pure memory controller's overhead,
+testing on tmpfs will give you good numbers of small overheads.
+Example: do kernel make on tmpfs.
+
+Page-fault scalability is also important. At measuring parallel
+page fault test, multi-process test may be better than multi-thread
+test because it has noise of shared objects/status.
+
+But the above two are testing extreme situations.
+Trying usual test under memory controller is always helpful.
+
+.. _cgroup-v1-memory-test-troubleshoot:
+
+4.1 Troubleshooting
+-------------------
+
+Sometimes a user might find that the application under a cgroup is
+terminated by the OOM killer. There are several causes for this:
+
+1. The cgroup limit is too low (just too low to do anything useful)
+2. The user is using anonymous memory and swap is turned off or too low
+
+A sync followed by echo 1 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches will help get rid of
+some of the pages cached in the cgroup (page cache pages).
+
+To know what happens, disabling OOM_Kill as per :ref:`"10. OOM Control"
+<cgroup-v1-memory-oom-control>` (below) and seeing what happens will be
+helpful.
+
+.. _cgroup-v1-memory-test-task-migration:
+
+4.2 Task migration
+------------------
+
+When a task migrates from one cgroup to another, its charge is not
+carried forward by default. The pages allocated from the original cgroup still
+remain charged to it, the charge is dropped when the page is freed or
+reclaimed.
+
+You can move charges of a task along with task migration.
+See :ref:`8. "Move charges at task migration" <cgroup-v1-memory-move-charges>`
+
+4.3 Removing a cgroup
+---------------------
+
+A cgroup can be removed by rmdir, but as discussed in :ref:`sections 4.1
+<cgroup-v1-memory-test-troubleshoot>` and :ref:`4.2
+<cgroup-v1-memory-test-task-migration>`, a cgroup might have some charge
+associated with it, even though all tasks have migrated away from it. (because
+we charge against pages, not against tasks.)
+
+We move the stats to parent, and no change on the charge except uncharging
+from the child.
+
+Charges recorded in swap information is not updated at removal of cgroup.
+Recorded information is discarded and a cgroup which uses swap (swapcache)
+will be charged as a new owner of it.
+
+5. Misc. interfaces
+===================
+
+5.1 force_empty
+---------------
+ memory.force_empty interface is provided to make cgroup's memory usage empty.
+ When writing anything to this::
+
+ # echo 0 > memory.force_empty
+
+ the cgroup will be reclaimed and as many pages reclaimed as possible.
+
+ The typical use case for this interface is before calling rmdir().
+ Though rmdir() offlines memcg, but the memcg may still stay there due to
+ charged file caches. Some out-of-use page caches may keep charged until
+ memory pressure happens. If you want to avoid that, force_empty will be useful.
+
+5.2 stat file
+-------------
+
+memory.stat file includes following statistics:
+
+ * per-memory cgroup local status
+
+ =============== ===============================================================
+ cache # of bytes of page cache memory.
+ rss # of bytes of anonymous and swap cache memory (includes
+ transparent hugepages).
+ rss_huge # of bytes of anonymous transparent hugepages.
+ mapped_file # of bytes of mapped file (includes tmpfs/shmem)
+ pgpgin # of charging events to the memory cgroup. The charging
+ event happens each time a page is accounted as either mapped
+ anon page(RSS) or cache page(Page Cache) to the cgroup.
+ pgpgout # of uncharging events to the memory cgroup. The uncharging
+ event happens each time a page is unaccounted from the
+ cgroup.
+ swap # of bytes of swap usage
+ dirty # of bytes that are waiting to get written back to the disk.
+ writeback # of bytes of file/anon cache that are queued for syncing to
+ disk.
+ inactive_anon # of bytes of anonymous and swap cache memory on inactive
+ LRU list.
+ active_anon # of bytes of anonymous and swap cache memory on active
+ LRU list.
+ inactive_file # of bytes of file-backed memory and MADV_FREE anonymous
+ memory (LazyFree pages) on inactive LRU list.
+ active_file # of bytes of file-backed memory on active LRU list.
+ unevictable # of bytes of memory that cannot be reclaimed (mlocked etc).
+ =============== ===============================================================
+
+ * status considering hierarchy (see memory.use_hierarchy settings):
+
+ ========================= ===================================================
+ hierarchical_memory_limit # of bytes of memory limit with regard to
+ hierarchy
+ under which the memory cgroup is
+ hierarchical_memsw_limit # of bytes of memory+swap limit with regard to
+ hierarchy under which memory cgroup is.
+
+ total_<counter> # hierarchical version of <counter>, which in
+ addition to the cgroup's own value includes the
+ sum of all hierarchical children's values of
+ <counter>, i.e. total_cache
+ ========================= ===================================================
+
+ * additional vm parameters (depends on CONFIG_DEBUG_VM):
+
+ ========================= ========================================
+ recent_rotated_anon VM internal parameter. (see mm/vmscan.c)
+ recent_rotated_file VM internal parameter. (see mm/vmscan.c)
+ recent_scanned_anon VM internal parameter. (see mm/vmscan.c)
+ recent_scanned_file VM internal parameter. (see mm/vmscan.c)
+ ========================= ========================================
+
+.. hint::
+ recent_rotated means recent frequency of LRU rotation.
+ recent_scanned means recent # of scans to LRU.
+ showing for better debug please see the code for meanings.
+
+.. note::
+ Only anonymous and swap cache memory is listed as part of 'rss' stat.
+ This should not be confused with the true 'resident set size' or the
+ amount of physical memory used by the cgroup.
+
+ 'rss + mapped_file" will give you resident set size of cgroup.
+
+ (Note: file and shmem may be shared among other cgroups. In that case,
+ mapped_file is accounted only when the memory cgroup is owner of page
+ cache.)
+
+5.3 swappiness
+--------------
+
+Overrides /proc/sys/vm/swappiness for the particular group. The tunable
+in the root cgroup corresponds to the global swappiness setting.
+
+Please note that unlike during the global reclaim, limit reclaim
+enforces that 0 swappiness really prevents from any swapping even if
+there is a swap storage available. This might lead to memcg OOM killer
+if there are no file pages to reclaim.
+
+5.4 failcnt
+-----------
+
+A memory cgroup provides memory.failcnt and memory.memsw.failcnt files.
+This failcnt(== failure count) shows the number of times that a usage counter
+hit its limit. When a memory cgroup hits a limit, failcnt increases and
+memory under it will be reclaimed.
+
+You can reset failcnt by writing 0 to failcnt file::
+
+ # echo 0 > .../memory.failcnt
+
+5.5 usage_in_bytes
+------------------
+
+For efficiency, as other kernel components, memory cgroup uses some optimization
+to avoid unnecessary cacheline false sharing. usage_in_bytes is affected by the
+method and doesn't show 'exact' value of memory (and swap) usage, it's a fuzz
+value for efficient access. (Of course, when necessary, it's synchronized.)
+If you want to know more exact memory usage, you should use RSS+CACHE(+SWAP)
+value in memory.stat(see 5.2).
+
+5.6 numa_stat
+-------------
+
+This is similar to numa_maps but operates on a per-memcg basis. This is
+useful for providing visibility into the numa locality information within
+an memcg since the pages are allowed to be allocated from any physical
+node. One of the use cases is evaluating application performance by
+combining this information with the application's CPU allocation.
+
+Each memcg's numa_stat file includes "total", "file", "anon" and "unevictable"
+per-node page counts including "hierarchical_<counter>" which sums up all
+hierarchical children's values in addition to the memcg's own value.
+
+The output format of memory.numa_stat is::
+
+ total=<total pages> N0=<node 0 pages> N1=<node 1 pages> ...
+ file=<total file pages> N0=<node 0 pages> N1=<node 1 pages> ...
+ anon=<total anon pages> N0=<node 0 pages> N1=<node 1 pages> ...
+ unevictable=<total anon pages> N0=<node 0 pages> N1=<node 1 pages> ...
+ hierarchical_<counter>=<counter pages> N0=<node 0 pages> N1=<node 1 pages> ...
+
+The "total" count is sum of file + anon + unevictable.
+
+6. Hierarchy support
+====================
+
+The memory controller supports a deep hierarchy and hierarchical accounting.
+The hierarchy is created by creating the appropriate cgroups in the
+cgroup filesystem. Consider for example, the following cgroup filesystem
+hierarchy::
+
+ root
+ / | \
+ / | \
+ a b c
+ | \
+ | \
+ d e
+
+In the diagram above, with hierarchical accounting enabled, all memory
+usage of e, is accounted to its ancestors up until the root (i.e, c and root).
+If one of the ancestors goes over its limit, the reclaim algorithm reclaims
+from the tasks in the ancestor and the children of the ancestor.
+
+6.1 Hierarchical accounting and reclaim
+---------------------------------------
+
+Hierarchical accounting is enabled by default. Disabling the hierarchical
+accounting is deprecated. An attempt to do it will result in a failure
+and a warning printed to dmesg.
+
+For compatibility reasons writing 1 to memory.use_hierarchy will always pass::
+
+ # echo 1 > memory.use_hierarchy
+
+7. Soft limits
+==============
+
+Soft limits allow for greater sharing of memory. The idea behind soft limits
+is to allow control groups to use as much of the memory as needed, provided
+
+a. There is no memory contention
+b. They do not exceed their hard limit
+
+When the system detects memory contention or low memory, control groups
+are pushed back to their soft limits. If the soft limit of each control
+group is very high, they are pushed back as much as possible to make
+sure that one control group does not starve the others of memory.
+
+Please note that soft limits is a best-effort feature; it comes with
+no guarantees, but it does its best to make sure that when memory is
+heavily contended for, memory is allocated based on the soft limit
+hints/setup. Currently soft limit based reclaim is set up such that
+it gets invoked from balance_pgdat (kswapd).
+
+7.1 Interface
+-------------
+
+Soft limits can be setup by using the following commands (in this example we
+assume a soft limit of 256 MiB)::
+
+ # echo 256M > memory.soft_limit_in_bytes
+
+If we want to change this to 1G, we can at any time use::
+
+ # echo 1G > memory.soft_limit_in_bytes
+
+.. note::
+ Soft limits take effect over a long period of time, since they involve
+ reclaiming memory for balancing between memory cgroups
+
+.. note::
+ It is recommended to set the soft limit always below the hard limit,
+ otherwise the hard limit will take precedence.
+
+.. _cgroup-v1-memory-move-charges:
+
+8. Move charges at task migration
+=================================
+
+Users can move charges associated with a task along with task migration, that
+is, uncharge task's pages from the old cgroup and charge them to the new cgroup.
+This feature is not supported in !CONFIG_MMU environments because of lack of
+page tables.
+
+8.1 Interface
+-------------
+
+This feature is disabled by default. It can be enabled (and disabled again) by
+writing to memory.move_charge_at_immigrate of the destination cgroup.
+
+If you want to enable it::
+
+ # echo (some positive value) > memory.move_charge_at_immigrate
+
+.. note::
+ Each bits of move_charge_at_immigrate has its own meaning about what type
+ of charges should be moved. See :ref:`section 8.2
+ <cgroup-v1-memory-movable-charges>` for details.
+
+.. note::
+ Charges are moved only when you move mm->owner, in other words,
+ a leader of a thread group.
+
+.. note::
+ If we cannot find enough space for the task in the destination cgroup, we
+ try to make space by reclaiming memory. Task migration may fail if we
+ cannot make enough space.
+
+.. note::
+ It can take several seconds if you move charges much.
+
+And if you want disable it again::
+
+ # echo 0 > memory.move_charge_at_immigrate
+
+.. _cgroup-v1-memory-movable-charges:
+
+8.2 Type of charges which can be moved
+--------------------------------------
+
+Each bit in move_charge_at_immigrate has its own meaning about what type of
+charges should be moved. But in any case, it must be noted that an account of
+a page or a swap can be moved only when it is charged to the task's current
+(old) memory cgroup.
+
++---+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|bit| what type of charges would be moved ? |
++===+==========================================================================+
+| 0 | A charge of an anonymous page (or swap of it) used by the target task. |
+| | You must enable Swap Extension (see 2.4) to enable move of swap charges. |
++---+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+| 1 | A charge of file pages (normal file, tmpfs file (e.g. ipc shared memory) |
+| | and swaps of tmpfs file) mmapped by the target task. Unlike the case of |
+| | anonymous pages, file pages (and swaps) in the range mmapped by the task |
+| | will be moved even if the task hasn't done page fault, i.e. they might |
+| | not be the task's "RSS", but other task's "RSS" that maps the same file. |
+| | And mapcount of the page is ignored (the page can be moved even if |
+| | page_mapcount(page) > 1). You must enable Swap Extension (see 2.4) to |
+| | enable move of swap charges. |
++---+--------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+
+8.3 TODO
+--------
+
+- All of moving charge operations are done under cgroup_mutex. It's not good
+ behavior to hold the mutex too long, so we may need some trick.
+
+9. Memory thresholds
+====================
+
+Memory cgroup implements memory thresholds using the cgroups notification
+API (see cgroups.txt). It allows to register multiple memory and memsw
+thresholds and gets notifications when it crosses.
+
+To register a threshold, an application must:
+
+- create an eventfd using eventfd(2);
+- open memory.usage_in_bytes or memory.memsw.usage_in_bytes;
+- write string like "<event_fd> <fd of memory.usage_in_bytes> <threshold>" to
+ cgroup.event_control.
+
+Application will be notified through eventfd when memory usage crosses
+threshold in any direction.
+
+It's applicable for root and non-root cgroup.
+
+.. _cgroup-v1-memory-oom-control:
+
+10. OOM Control
+===============
+
+memory.oom_control file is for OOM notification and other controls.
+
+Memory cgroup implements OOM notifier using the cgroup notification
+API (See cgroups.txt). It allows to register multiple OOM notification
+delivery and gets notification when OOM happens.
+
+To register a notifier, an application must:
+
+ - create an eventfd using eventfd(2)
+ - open memory.oom_control file
+ - write string like "<event_fd> <fd of memory.oom_control>" to
+ cgroup.event_control
+
+The application will be notified through eventfd when OOM happens.
+OOM notification doesn't work for the root cgroup.
+
+You can disable the OOM-killer by writing "1" to memory.oom_control file, as:
+
+ #echo 1 > memory.oom_control
+
+If OOM-killer is disabled, tasks under cgroup will hang/sleep
+in memory cgroup's OOM-waitqueue when they request accountable memory.
+
+For running them, you have to relax the memory cgroup's OOM status by
+
+ * enlarge limit or reduce usage.
+
+To reduce usage,
+
+ * kill some tasks.
+ * move some tasks to other group with account migration.
+ * remove some files (on tmpfs?)
+
+Then, stopped tasks will work again.
+
+At reading, current status of OOM is shown.
+
+ - oom_kill_disable 0 or 1
+ (if 1, oom-killer is disabled)
+ - under_oom 0 or 1
+ (if 1, the memory cgroup is under OOM, tasks may be stopped.)
+ - oom_kill integer counter
+ The number of processes belonging to this cgroup killed by any
+ kind of OOM killer.
+
+11. Memory Pressure
+===================
+
+The pressure level notifications can be used to monitor the memory
+allocation cost; based on the pressure, applications can implement
+different strategies of managing their memory resources. The pressure
+levels are defined as following:
+
+The "low" level means that the system is reclaiming memory for new
+allocations. Monitoring this reclaiming activity might be useful for
+maintaining cache level. Upon notification, the program (typically
+"Activity Manager") might analyze vmstat and act in advance (i.e.
+prematurely shutdown unimportant services).
+
+The "medium" level means that the system is experiencing medium memory
+pressure, the system might be making swap, paging out active file caches,
+etc. Upon this event applications may decide to further analyze
+vmstat/zoneinfo/memcg or internal memory usage statistics and free any
+resources that can be easily reconstructed or re-read from a disk.
+
+The "critical" level means that the system is actively thrashing, it is
+about to out of memory (OOM) or even the in-kernel OOM killer is on its
+way to trigger. Applications should do whatever they can to help the
+system. It might be too late to consult with vmstat or any other
+statistics, so it's advisable to take an immediate action.
+
+By default, events are propagated upward until the event is handled, i.e. the
+events are not pass-through. For example, you have three cgroups: A->B->C. Now
+you set up an event listener on cgroups A, B and C, and suppose group C
+experiences some pressure. In this situation, only group C will receive the
+notification, i.e. groups A and B will not receive it. This is done to avoid
+excessive "broadcasting" of messages, which disturbs the system and which is
+especially bad if we are low on memory or thrashing. Group B, will receive
+notification only if there are no event listers for group C.
+
+There are three optional modes that specify different propagation behavior:
+
+ - "default": this is the default behavior specified above. This mode is the
+ same as omitting the optional mode parameter, preserved by backwards
+ compatibility.
+
+ - "hierarchy": events always propagate up to the root, similar to the default
+ behavior, except that propagation continues regardless of whether there are
+ event listeners at each level, with the "hierarchy" mode. In the above
+ example, groups A, B, and C will receive notification of memory pressure.
+
+ - "local": events are pass-through, i.e. they only receive notifications when
+ memory pressure is experienced in the memcg for which the notification is
+ registered. In the above example, group C will receive notification if
+ registered for "local" notification and the group experiences memory
+ pressure. However, group B will never receive notification, regardless if
+ there is an event listener for group C or not, if group B is registered for
+ local notification.
+
+The level and event notification mode ("hierarchy" or "local", if necessary) are
+specified by a comma-delimited string, i.e. "low,hierarchy" specifies
+hierarchical, pass-through, notification for all ancestor memcgs. Notification
+that is the default, non pass-through behavior, does not specify a mode.
+"medium,local" specifies pass-through notification for the medium level.
+
+The file memory.pressure_level is only used to setup an eventfd. To
+register a notification, an application must:
+
+- create an eventfd using eventfd(2);
+- open memory.pressure_level;
+- write string as "<event_fd> <fd of memory.pressure_level> <level[,mode]>"
+ to cgroup.event_control.
+
+Application will be notified through eventfd when memory pressure is at
+the specific level (or higher). Read/write operations to
+memory.pressure_level are no implemented.
+
+Test:
+
+ Here is a small script example that makes a new cgroup, sets up a
+ memory limit, sets up a notification in the cgroup and then makes child
+ cgroup experience a critical pressure::
+
+ # cd /sys/fs/cgroup/memory/
+ # mkdir foo
+ # cd foo
+ # cgroup_event_listener memory.pressure_level low,hierarchy &
+ # echo 8000000 > memory.limit_in_bytes
+ # echo 8000000 > memory.memsw.limit_in_bytes
+ # echo $$ > tasks
+ # dd if=/dev/zero | read x
+
+ (Expect a bunch of notifications, and eventually, the oom-killer will
+ trigger.)
+
+12. TODO
+========
+
+1. Make per-cgroup scanner reclaim not-shared pages first
+2. Teach controller to account for shared-pages
+3. Start reclamation in the background when the limit is
+ not yet hit but the usage is getting closer
+
+Summary
+=======
+
+Overall, the memory controller has been a stable controller and has been
+commented and discussed quite extensively in the community.
+
+References
+==========
+
+.. [1] Singh, Balbir. RFC: Memory Controller, http://lwn.net/Articles/206697/
+.. [2] Singh, Balbir. Memory Controller (RSS Control),
+ http://lwn.net/Articles/222762/
+.. [3] Emelianov, Pavel. Resource controllers based on process cgroups
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/45ED7DEC.7010403@sw.ru
+.. [4] Emelianov, Pavel. RSS controller based on process cgroups (v2)
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/461A3010.90403@sw.ru
+.. [5] Emelianov, Pavel. RSS controller based on process cgroups (v3)
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/465D9739.8070209@openvz.org
+
+6. Menage, Paul. Control Groups v10, http://lwn.net/Articles/236032/
+7. Vaidyanathan, Srinivasan, Control Groups: Pagecache accounting and control
+ subsystem (v3), http://lwn.net/Articles/235534/
+8. Singh, Balbir. RSS controller v2 test results (lmbench),
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/464C95D4.7070806@linux.vnet.ibm.com
+9. Singh, Balbir. RSS controller v2 AIM9 results
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/464D267A.50107@linux.vnet.ibm.com
+10. Singh, Balbir. Memory controller v6 test results,
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/20070819094658.654.84837.sendpatchset@balbir-laptop
+
+.. [11] Singh, Balbir. Memory controller introduction (v6),
+ https://lore.kernel.org/r/20070817084228.26003.12568.sendpatchset@balbir-laptop
+.. [12] Corbet, Jonathan, Controlling memory use in cgroups,
+ http://lwn.net/Articles/243795/