[Nouveau] [PATCH drm-misc-next v3 5/7] drm/gpuvm: add an abstraction for a VM / BO combination

[Danilo Krummrich]

Hi Thomas,

On 9/11/23 19:19, Thomas Hellström wrote:
> Hi, Danilo
> 
> On 9/9/23 17:31, Danilo Krummrich wrote:
>> This patch adds an abstraction layer between the drm_gpuva mappings of
>> a particular drm_gem_object and this GEM object itself. The abstraction
>> represents a combination of a drm_gem_object and drm_gpuvm. The
>> drm_gem_object holds a list of drm_gpuvm_bo structures (the structure
>> representing this abstraction), while each drm_gpuvm_bo contains list of
>> mappings of this GEM object.
>>
>> This has multiple advantages:
>>
>> 1) We can use the drm_gpuvm_bo structure to attach it to various lists
>>     of the drm_gpuvm. This is useful for tracking external and evicted
>>     objects per VM, which is introduced in subsequent patches.
>>
>> 2) Finding mappings of a certain drm_gem_object mapped in a certain
>>     drm_gpuvm becomes much cheaper.
>>
>> 3) Drivers can derive and extend the structure to easily represent
>>     driver specific states of a BO for a certain GPUVM.
>>
>> The idea of this abstraction was taken from amdgpu, hence the credit for
>> this idea goes to the developers of amdgpu.
>>
>> Cc: Christian König <christian.koenig at amd.com>
>> Signed-off-by: Danilo Krummrich <dakr at redhat.com>
> 
> Did you consider having the drivers embed the struct drm_gpuvm_bo in their own bo definition? I figure that would mean using the gem bo's refcounting and providing a helper to call from the driver's bo release. Looks like that could potentially save a lot of code? Or is there something that won't work with that approach?

There are drm_gpuvm_ops::vm_bo_alloc and drm_gpuvm_ops::vm_bo_free callback for drivers to register for that purpose.

- Danilo

> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Thomas
> 
>