sched/api: Introduce task_rcu_dereference() and try_get_task_struct()

Generally task_struct is only protected by RCU if it was found on a
RCU protected list (say, for_each_process() or find_task_by_vpid()).

As Kirill pointed out rq->curr isn't protected by RCU, the scheduler
drops the (potentially) last reference without RCU gp, this means
that we need to fix the code which uses foreign_rq->curr under
rcu_read_lock().

Add a new helper which can be used to dereference rq->curr or any
other pointer to task_struct assuming that it should be cleared or
updated before the final put_task_struct(). It returns non-NULL
only if this task can't go away before rcu_read_unlock().

( Also add try_get_task_struct() to make it easier to use this API
  correctly. )

Suggested-by: Kirill Tkhai <[email protected]>
Signed-off-by: Oleg Nesterov <[email protected]>
[ Updated comments; added try_get_task_struct()]
Signed-off-by: Peter Zijlstra (Intel) <[email protected]>
Cc: Chris Metcalf <[email protected]>
Cc: Christoph Lameter <[email protected]>
Cc: Kirill Tkhai <[email protected]>
Cc: Linus Torvalds <[email protected]>
Cc: Mike Galbraith <[email protected]>
Cc: Peter Zijlstra <[email protected]>
Cc: Thomas Gleixner <[email protected]>
Cc: Vladimir Davydov <[email protected]>
Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/[email protected]
Signed-off-by: Ingo Molnar <[email protected]>

include/linux/sched.h

@@ -2139,6 +2139,9 @@ static inline void put_task_struct(struct task_struct *t)
 		__put_task_struct(t);
 }
 
+struct task_struct *task_rcu_dereference(struct task_struct **ptask);
+struct task_struct *try_get_task_struct(struct task_struct **ptask);
+
 #ifdef CONFIG_VIRT_CPU_ACCOUNTING_GEN
 extern void task_cputime(struct task_struct *t,
 			 cputime_t *utime, cputime_t *stime);

kernel/exit.c

@@ -210,6 +210,82 @@ void release_task(struct task_struct *p)
 		goto repeat;
 }
 
+/*
+ * Note that if this function returns a valid task_struct pointer (!NULL)
+ * task->usage must remain >0 for the duration of the RCU critical section.
+ */
+struct task_struct *task_rcu_dereference(struct task_struct **ptask)
+{
+	struct sighand_struct *sighand;
+	struct task_struct *task;
+
+	/*
+	 * We need to verify that release_task() was not called and thus
+	 * delayed_put_task_struct() can't run and drop the last reference
+	 * before rcu_read_unlock(). We check task->sighand != NULL,
+	 * but we can read the already freed and reused memory.
+	 */
+retry:
+	task = rcu_dereference(*ptask);
+	if (!task)
+		return NULL;
+
+	probe_kernel_address(&task->sighand, sighand);
+
+	/*
+	 * Pairs with atomic_dec_and_test() in put_task_struct(). If this task
+	 * was already freed we can not miss the preceding update of this
+	 * pointer.
+	 */
+	smp_rmb();
+	if (unlikely(task != READ_ONCE(*ptask)))
+		goto retry;
+
+	/*
+	 * We've re-checked that "task == *ptask", now we have two different
+	 * cases:
+	 *
+	 * 1. This is actually the same task/task_struct. In this case
+	 *    sighand != NULL tells us it is still alive.
+	 *
+	 * 2. This is another task which got the same memory for task_struct.
+	 *    We can't know this of course, and we can not trust
+	 *    sighand != NULL.
+	 *
+	 *    In this case we actually return a random value, but this is
+	 *    correct.
+	 *
+	 *    If we return NULL - we can pretend that we actually noticed that
+	 *    *ptask was updated when the previous task has exited. Or pretend
+	 *    that probe_slab_address(&sighand) reads NULL.
+	 *
+	 *    If we return the new task (because sighand is not NULL for any
+	 *    reason) - this is fine too. This (new) task can't go away before
+	 *    another gp pass.
+	 *
+	 *    And note: We could even eliminate the false positive if re-read
+	 *    task->sighand once again to avoid the falsely NULL. But this case
+	 *    is very unlikely so we don't care.
+	 */
+	if (!sighand)
+		return NULL;
+
+	return task;
+}
+
+struct task_struct *try_get_task_struct(struct task_struct **ptask)
+{
+	struct task_struct *task;
+
+	rcu_read_lock();
+	task = task_rcu_dereference(ptask);
+	if (task)
+		get_task_struct(task);
+	rcu_read_unlock();
+
+	return task;
+}
+
 /*
  * Determine if a process group is "orphaned", according to the POSIX
  * definition in 2.2.2.52.  Orphaned process groups are not to be affected