Documentation/mm: avoid invalid use of addresses from kmap_local_page()

Users of kmap_local_page() must be absolutely sure to not hand kernel
virtual address obtained calling kmap_local_page() on highmem pages to
other contexts because those pointers are thread local, therefore, they
are no longer valid across different contexts.

Extend the documentation of kmap_local_page() to warn users about the
above-mentioned potential invalid use of pointers returned by
kmap_local_page().

Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20220728154844.10874-5-fmdefrancesco@gmail.com
Signed-off-by: Fabio M. De Francesco <fmdefrancesco@gmail.com>
Suggested-by: Ira Weiny <ira.weiny@intel.com>
Cc: Matthew Wilcox (Oracle) <willy@infradead.org>
Cc: Mike Rapoport <rppt@linux.ibm.com>
Cc: Sebastian Andrzej Siewior <bigeasy@linutronix.de>
Cc: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@linutronix.de>
Cc: Catalin Marinas <catalin.marinas@arm.com>
Cc: Jonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>
Cc: Peter Collingbourne <pcc@google.com>
Cc: Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@suse.cz>
Cc: Will Deacon <will@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>

diff --git a/Documentation/mm/highmem.rst b/Documentation/mm/highmem.rst
index 34d7097d3ce8edb944bfbf179a51ecad89c0b348..71dc09563ff862abc47ed2f910bf844817268005 100644 (file)
--- a/Documentation/mm/highmem.rst
+++ b/Documentation/mm/highmem.rst
@@ -77,6 +77,13 @@ list shows them in order of preference of use.
   for pages which are known to not come from ZONE_HIGHMEM. However, it is
   always safe to use kmap_local_page() / kunmap_local().
 
+  While it is significantly faster than kmap(), for the higmem case it
+  comes with restrictions about the pointers validity. Contrary to kmap()
+  mappings, the local mappings are only valid in the context of the caller
+  and cannot be handed to other contexts. This implies that users must
+  be absolutely sure to keep the use of the return address local to the
+  thread which mapped it.
+
   Nesting kmap_local_page() and kmap_atomic() mappings is allowed to a certain
   extent (up to KMAP_TYPE_NR) but their invocations have to be strictly ordered
   because the map implementation is stack based. See kmap_local_page() kdocs