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SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0 + +====================== +The x86 kvm shadow mmu +====================== + +The mmu (in arch/x86/kvm, files mmu.[ch] and paging_tmpl.h) is responsible +for presenting a standard x86 mmu to the guest, while translating guest +physical addresses to host physical addresses. + +The mmu code attempts to satisfy the following requirements: + +- correctness: + the guest should not be able to determine that it is running + on an emulated mmu except for timing (we attempt to comply + with the specification, not emulate the characteristics of + a particular implementation such as tlb size) +- security: + the guest must not be able to touch host memory not assigned + to it +- performance: + minimize the performance penalty imposed by the mmu +- scaling: + need to scale to large memory and large vcpu guests +- hardware: + support the full range of x86 virtualization hardware +- integration: + Linux memory management code must be in control of guest memory + so that swapping, page migration, page merging, transparent + hugepages, and similar features work without change +- dirty tracking: + report writes to guest memory to enable live migration + and framebuffer-based displays +- footprint: + keep the amount of pinned kernel memory low (most memory + should be shrinkable) +- reliability: + avoid multipage or GFP_ATOMIC allocations + +Acronyms +======== + +==== ==================================================================== +pfn host page frame number +hpa host physical address +hva host virtual address +gfn guest frame number +gpa guest physical address +gva guest virtual address +ngpa nested guest physical address +ngva nested guest virtual address +pte page table entry (used also to refer generically to paging structure + entries) +gpte guest pte (referring to gfns) +spte shadow pte (referring to pfns) +tdp two dimensional paging (vendor neutral term for NPT and EPT) +==== ==================================================================== + +Virtual and real hardware supported +=================================== + +The mmu supports first-generation mmu hardware, which allows an atomic switch +of the current paging mode and cr3 during guest entry, as well as +two-dimensional paging (AMD's NPT and Intel's EPT). The emulated hardware +it exposes is the traditional 2/3/4 level x86 mmu, with support for global +pages, pae, pse, pse36, cr0.wp, and 1GB pages. Emulated hardware also +able to expose NPT capable hardware on NPT capable hosts. + +Translation +=========== + +The primary job of the mmu is to program the processor's mmu to translate +addresses for the guest. Different translations are required at different +times: + +- when guest paging is disabled, we translate guest physical addresses to + host physical addresses (gpa->hpa) +- when guest paging is enabled, we translate guest virtual addresses, to + guest physical addresses, to host physical addresses (gva->gpa->hpa) +- when the guest launches a guest of its own, we translate nested guest + virtual addresses, to nested guest physical addresses, to guest physical + addresses, to host physical addresses (ngva->ngpa->gpa->hpa) + +The primary challenge is to encode between 1 and 3 translations into hardware +that support only 1 (traditional) and 2 (tdp) translations. When the +number of required translations matches the hardware, the mmu operates in +direct mode; otherwise it operates in shadow mode (see below). + +Memory +====== + +Guest memory (gpa) is part of the user address space of the process that is +using kvm. Userspace defines the translation between guest addresses and user +addresses (gpa->hva); note that two gpas may alias to the same hva, but not +vice versa. + +These hvas may be backed using any method available to the host: anonymous +memory, file backed memory, and device memory. Memory might be paged by the +host at any time. + +Events +====== + +The mmu is driven by events, some from the guest, some from the host. + +Guest generated events: + +- writes to control registers (especially cr3) +- invlpg/invlpga instruction execution +- access to missing or protected translations + +Host generated events: + +- changes in the gpa->hpa translation (either through gpa->hva changes or + through hva->hpa changes) +- memory pressure (the shrinker) + +Shadow pages +============ + +The principal data structure is the shadow page, 'struct kvm_mmu_page'. A +shadow page contains 512 sptes, which can be either leaf or nonleaf sptes. A +shadow page may contain a mix of leaf and nonleaf sptes. + +A nonleaf spte allows the hardware mmu to reach the leaf pages and +is not related to a translation directly. It points to other shadow pages. + +A leaf spte corresponds to either one or two translations encoded into +one paging structure entry. These are always the lowest level of the +translation stack, with optional higher level translations left to NPT/EPT. +Leaf ptes point at guest pages. + +The following table shows translations encoded by leaf ptes, with higher-level +translations in parentheses: + + Non-nested guests:: + + nonpaging: gpa->hpa + paging: gva->gpa->hpa + paging, tdp: (gva->)gpa->hpa + + Nested guests:: + + non-tdp: ngva->gpa->hpa (*) + tdp: (ngva->)ngpa->gpa->hpa + + (*) the guest hypervisor will encode the ngva->gpa translation into its page + tables if npt is not present + +Shadow pages contain the following information: + role.level: + The level in the shadow paging hierarchy that this shadow page belongs to. + 1=4k sptes, 2=2M sptes, 3=1G sptes, etc. + role.direct: + If set, leaf sptes reachable from this page are for a linear range. + Examples include real mode translation, large guest pages backed by small + host pages, and gpa->hpa translations when NPT or EPT is active. + The linear range starts at (gfn << PAGE_SHIFT) and its size is determined + by role.level (2MB for first level, 1GB for second level, 0.5TB for third + level, 256TB for fourth level) + If clear, this page corresponds to a guest page table denoted by the gfn + field. + role.quadrant: + When role.has_4_byte_gpte=1, the guest uses 32-bit gptes while the host uses 64-bit + sptes. That means a guest page table contains more ptes than the host, + so multiple shadow pages are needed to shadow one guest page. + For first-level shadow pages, role.quadrant can be 0 or 1 and denotes the + first or second 512-gpte block in the guest page table. For second-level + page tables, each 32-bit gpte is converted to two 64-bit sptes + (since each first-level guest page is shadowed by two first-level + shadow pages) so role.quadrant takes values in the range 0..3. Each + quadrant maps 1GB virtual address space. + role.access: + Inherited guest access permissions from the parent ptes in the form uwx. + Note execute permission is positive, not negative. + role.invalid: + The page is invalid and should not be used. It is a root page that is + currently pinned (by a cpu hardware register pointing to it); once it is + unpinned it will be destroyed. + role.has_4_byte_gpte: + Reflects the size of the guest PTE for which the page is valid, i.e. '0' + if direct map or 64-bit gptes are in use, '1' if 32-bit gptes are in use. + role.efer_nx: + Contains the value of efer.nx for which the page is valid. + role.cr0_wp: + Contains the value of cr0.wp for which the page is valid. + role.smep_andnot_wp: + Contains the value of cr4.smep && !cr0.wp for which the page is valid + (pages for which this is true are different from other pages; see the + treatment of cr0.wp=0 below). + role.smap_andnot_wp: + Contains the value of cr4.smap && !cr0.wp for which the page is valid + (pages for which this is true are different from other pages; see the + treatment of cr0.wp=0 below). + role.smm: + Is 1 if the page is valid in system management mode. This field + determines which of the kvm_memslots array was used to build this + shadow page; it is also used to go back from a struct kvm_mmu_page + to a memslot, through the kvm_memslots_for_spte_role macro and + __gfn_to_memslot. + role.ad_disabled: + Is 1 if the MMU instance cannot use A/D bits. EPT did not have A/D + bits before Haswell; shadow EPT page tables also cannot use A/D bits + if the L1 hypervisor does not enable them. + role.passthrough: + The page is not backed by a guest page table, but its first entry + points to one. This is set if NPT uses 5-level page tables (host + CR4.LA57=1) and is shadowing L1's 4-level NPT (L1 CR4.LA57=0). + gfn: + Either the guest page table containing the translations shadowed by this + page, or the base page frame for linear translations. See role.direct. + spt: + A pageful of 64-bit sptes containing the translations for this page. + Accessed by both kvm and hardware. + The page pointed to by spt will have its page->private pointing back + at the shadow page structure. + sptes in spt point either at guest pages, or at lower-level shadow pages. + Specifically, if sp1 and sp2 are shadow pages, then sp1->spt[n] may point + at __pa(sp2->spt). sp2 will point back at sp1 through parent_pte. + The spt array forms a DAG structure with the shadow page as a node, and + guest pages as leaves. + gfns: + An array of 512 guest frame numbers, one for each present pte. Used to + perform a reverse map from a pte to a gfn. When role.direct is set, any + element of this array can be calculated from the gfn field when used, in + this case, the array of gfns is not allocated. See role.direct and gfn. + root_count: + A counter keeping track of how many hardware registers (guest cr3 or + pdptrs) are now pointing at the page. While this counter is nonzero, the + page cannot be destroyed. See role.invalid. + parent_ptes: + The reverse mapping for the pte/ptes pointing at this page's spt. If + parent_ptes bit 0 is zero, only one spte points at this page and + parent_ptes points at this single spte, otherwise, there exists multiple + sptes pointing at this page and (parent_ptes & ~0x1) points at a data + structure with a list of parent sptes. + unsync: + If true, then the translations in this page may not match the guest's + translation. This is equivalent to the state of the tlb when a pte is + changed but before the tlb entry is flushed. Accordingly, unsync ptes + are synchronized when the guest executes invlpg or flushes its tlb by + other means. Valid for leaf pages. + unsync_children: + How many sptes in the page point at pages that are unsync (or have + unsynchronized children). + unsync_child_bitmap: + A bitmap indicating which sptes in spt point (directly or indirectly) at + pages that may be unsynchronized. Used to quickly locate all unsynchronized + pages reachable from a given page. + clear_spte_count: + Only present on 32-bit hosts, where a 64-bit spte cannot be written + atomically. The reader uses this while running out of the MMU lock + to detect in-progress updates and retry them until the writer has + finished the write. + write_flooding_count: + A guest may write to a page table many times, causing a lot of + emulations if the page needs to be write-protected (see "Synchronized + and unsynchronized pages" below). Leaf pages can be unsynchronized + so that they do not trigger frequent emulation, but this is not + possible for non-leafs. This field counts the number of emulations + since the last time the page table was actually used; if emulation + is triggered too frequently on this page, KVM will unmap the page + to avoid emulation in the future. + +Reverse map +=========== + +The mmu maintains a reverse mapping whereby all ptes mapping a page can be +reached given its gfn. This is used, for example, when swapping out a page. + +Synchronized and unsynchronized pages +===================================== + +The guest uses two events to synchronize its tlb and page tables: tlb flushes +and page invalidations (invlpg). + +A tlb flush means that we need to synchronize all sptes reachable from the +guest's cr3. This is expensive, so we keep all guest page tables write +protected, and synchronize sptes to gptes when a gpte is written. + +A special case is when a guest page table is reachable from the current +guest cr3. In this case, the guest is obliged to issue an invlpg instruction +before using the translation. We take advantage of that by removing write +protection from the guest page, and allowing the guest to modify it freely. +We synchronize modified gptes when the guest invokes invlpg. This reduces +the amount of emulation we have to do when the guest modifies multiple gptes, +or when the a guest page is no longer used as a page table and is used for +random guest data. + +As a side effect we have to resynchronize all reachable unsynchronized shadow +pages on a tlb flush. + + +Reaction to events +================== + +- guest page fault (or npt page fault, or ept violation) + +This is the most complicated event. The cause of a page fault can be: + + - a true guest fault (the guest translation won't allow the access) (*) + - access to a missing translation + - access to a protected translation + - when logging dirty pages, memory is write protected + - synchronized shadow pages are write protected (*) + - access to untranslatable memory (mmio) + + (*) not applicable in direct mode + +Handling a page fault is performed as follows: + + - if the RSV bit of the error code is set, the page fault is caused by guest + accessing MMIO and cached MMIO information is available. + + - walk shadow page table + - check for valid generation number in the spte (see "Fast invalidation of + MMIO sptes" below) + - cache the information to vcpu->arch.mmio_gva, vcpu->arch.mmio_access and + vcpu->arch.mmio_gfn, and call the emulator + + - If both P bit and R/W bit of error code are set, this could possibly + be handled as a "fast page fault" (fixed without taking the MMU lock). See + the description in Documentation/virt/kvm/locking.rst. + + - if needed, walk the guest page tables to determine the guest translation + (gva->gpa or ngpa->gpa) + + - if permissions are insufficient, reflect the fault back to the guest + + - determine the host page + + - if this is an mmio request, there is no host page; cache the info to + vcpu->arch.mmio_gva, vcpu->arch.mmio_access and vcpu->arch.mmio_gfn + + - walk the shadow page table to find the spte for the translation, + instantiating missing intermediate page tables as necessary + + - If this is an mmio request, cache the mmio info to the spte and set some + reserved bit on the spte (see callers of kvm_mmu_set_mmio_spte_mask) + + - try to unsynchronize the page + + - if successful, we can let the guest continue and modify the gpte + + - emulate the instruction + + - if failed, unshadow the page and let the guest continue + + - update any translations that were modified by the instruction + +invlpg handling: + + - walk the shadow page hierarchy and drop affected translations + - try to reinstantiate the indicated translation in the hope that the + guest will use it in the near future + +Guest control register updates: + +- mov to cr3 + + - look up new shadow roots + - synchronize newly reachable shadow pages + +- mov to cr0/cr4/efer + + - set up mmu context for new paging mode + - look up new shadow roots + - synchronize newly reachable shadow pages + +Host translation updates: + + - mmu notifier called with updated hva + - look up affected sptes through reverse map + - drop (or update) translations + +Emulating cr0.wp +================ + +If tdp is not enabled, the host must keep cr0.wp=1 so page write protection +works for the guest kernel, not guest userspace. When the guest +cr0.wp=1, this does not present a problem. However when the guest cr0.wp=0, +we cannot map the permissions for gpte.u=1, gpte.w=0 to any spte (the +semantics require allowing any guest kernel access plus user read access). + +We handle this by mapping the permissions to two possible sptes, depending +on fault type: + +- kernel write fault: spte.u=0, spte.w=1 (allows full kernel access, + disallows user access) +- read fault: spte.u=1, spte.w=0 (allows full read access, disallows kernel + write access) + +(user write faults generate a #PF) + +In the first case there are two additional complications: + +- if CR4.SMEP is enabled: since we've turned the page into a kernel page, + the kernel may now execute it. We handle this by also setting spte.nx. + If we get a user fetch or read fault, we'll change spte.u=1 and + spte.nx=gpte.nx back. For this to work, KVM forces EFER.NX to 1 when + shadow paging is in use. +- if CR4.SMAP is disabled: since the page has been changed to a kernel + page, it can not be reused when CR4.SMAP is enabled. We set + CR4.SMAP && !CR0.WP into shadow page's role to avoid this case. Note, + here we do not care the case that CR4.SMAP is enabled since KVM will + directly inject #PF to guest due to failed permission check. + +To prevent an spte that was converted into a kernel page with cr0.wp=0 +from being written by the kernel after cr0.wp has changed to 1, we make +the value of cr0.wp part of the page role. This means that an spte created +with one value of cr0.wp cannot be used when cr0.wp has a different value - +it will simply be missed by the shadow page lookup code. A similar issue +exists when an spte created with cr0.wp=0 and cr4.smep=0 is used after +changing cr4.smep to 1. To avoid this, the value of !cr0.wp && cr4.smep +is also made a part of the page role. + +Large pages +=========== + +The mmu supports all combinations of large and small guest and host pages. +Supported page sizes include 4k, 2M, 4M, and 1G. 4M pages are treated as +two separate 2M pages, on both guest and host, since the mmu always uses PAE +paging. + +To instantiate a large spte, four constraints must be satisfied: + +- the spte must point to a large host page +- the guest pte must be a large pte of at least equivalent size (if tdp is + enabled, there is no guest pte and this condition is satisfied) +- if the spte will be writeable, the large page frame may not overlap any + write-protected pages +- the guest page must be wholly contained by a single memory slot + +To check the last two conditions, the mmu maintains a ->disallow_lpage set of +arrays for each memory slot and large page size. Every write protected page +causes its disallow_lpage to be incremented, thus preventing instantiation of +a large spte. The frames at the end of an unaligned memory slot have +artificially inflated ->disallow_lpages so they can never be instantiated. + +Fast invalidation of MMIO sptes +=============================== + +As mentioned in "Reaction to events" above, kvm will cache MMIO +information in leaf sptes. When a new memslot is added or an existing +memslot is changed, this information may become stale and needs to be +invalidated. This also needs to hold the MMU lock while walking all +shadow pages, and is made more scalable with a similar technique. + +MMIO sptes have a few spare bits, which are used to store a +generation number. The global generation number is stored in +kvm_memslots(kvm)->generation, and increased whenever guest memory info +changes. + +When KVM finds an MMIO spte, it checks the generation number of the spte. +If the generation number of the spte does not equal the global generation +number, it will ignore the cached MMIO information and handle the page +fault through the slow path. + +Since only 18 bits are used to store generation-number on mmio spte, all +pages are zapped when there is an overflow. + +Unfortunately, a single memory access might access kvm_memslots(kvm) multiple +times, the last one happening when the generation number is retrieved and +stored into the MMIO spte. Thus, the MMIO spte might be created based on +out-of-date information, but with an up-to-date generation number. + +To avoid this, the generation number is incremented again after synchronize_srcu +returns; thus, bit 63 of kvm_memslots(kvm)->generation set to 1 only during a +memslot update, while some SRCU readers might be using the old copy. We do not +want to use an MMIO sptes created with an odd generation number, and we can do +this without losing a bit in the MMIO spte. The "update in-progress" bit of the +generation is not stored in MMIO spte, and is so is implicitly zero when the +generation is extracted out of the spte. If KVM is unlucky and creates an MMIO +spte while an update is in-progress, the next access to the spte will always be +a cache miss. For example, a subsequent access during the update window will +miss due to the in-progress flag diverging, while an access after the update +window closes will have a higher generation number (as compared to the spte). + + +Further reading +=============== + +- NPT presentation from KVM Forum 2008 + https://www.linux-kvm.org/images/c/c8/KvmForum2008%24kdf2008_21.pdf |