Linux kernel
============
There are several guides for kernel developers and users. These guides can
be rendered in a number of formats, like HTML and PDF. Please read
Documentation/admin-guide/README.rst first.
In order to build the documentation, use ``make htmldocs`` or
``make pdfdocs``. The formatted documentation can also be read online at:
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/
There are various text files in the Documentation/ subdirectory,
several of them using the Restructured Text markup notation.
See Documentation/00-INDEX for a list of what is contained in each file.
Please read the Documentation/process/changes.rst file, as it contains the
requirements for building and running the kernel, and information about
the problems which may result by upgrading your kernel.
Logan Gunthorpe
authored
Some PCI devices may have memory mapped in a BAR space that's intended for use in peer-to-peer transactions. To enable such transactions the memory must be registered with ZONE_DEVICE pages so it can be used by DMA interfaces in existing drivers. Add an interface for other subsystems to find and allocate chunks of P2P memory as necessary to facilitate transfers between two PCI peers: struct pci_dev *pci_p2pmem_find[_many](); int pci_p2pdma_distance[_many](); void *pci_alloc_p2pmem(); The new interface requires a driver to collect a list of client devices involved in the transaction then call pci_p2pmem_find() to obtain any suitable P2P memory. Alternatively, if the caller knows a device which provides P2P memory, they can use pci_p2pdma_distance() to determine if it is usable. With a suitable p2pmem device, memory can then be allocated with pci_alloc_p2pmem() for use in DMA transactions. Depending on hardware, using peer-to-peer memory may reduce the bandwidth of the transfer but can significantly reduce pressure on system memory. This may be desirable in many cases: for example a system could be designed with a small CPU connected to a PCIe switch by a small number of lanes which would maximize the number of lanes available to connect to NVMe devices. The code is designed to only utilize the p2pmem device if all the devices involved in a transfer are behind the same PCI bridge. This is because we have no way of knowing whether peer-to-peer routing between PCIe Root Ports is supported (PCIe r4.0, sec 1.3.1). Additionally, the benefits of P2P transfers that go through the RC is limited to only reducing DRAM usage and, in some cases, coding convenience. The PCI-SIG may be exploring adding a new capability bit to advertise whether this is possible for future hardware. This commit includes significant rework and feedback from Christoph Hellwig. Signed-off-by:Christoph Hellwig <hch@lst.de> Signed-off-by:
Logan Gunthorpe <logang@deltatee.com> [bhelgaas: fold in fix from Keith Busch <keith.busch@intel.com>: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-pci/20181012155920.15418-1-keith.busch@intel.com, to address comment from Dan Carpenter <dan.carpenter@oracle.com>, fold in https://lore.kernel.org/linux-pci/20181017160510.17926-1-logang@deltatee.com ] Signed-off-by:
Bjorn Helgaas <bhelgaas@google.com>