RFR: 8170307: Stack size option -Xss is ignored

Daniel D. Daugherty daniel.daugherty at oracle.com
Tue Nov 29 17:57:50 UTC 2016


Sorry for being late to this party! Seems like thread stack sizes are
very much on folks minds lately...

 > webrev: http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~dholmes/8170307/webrev/

src/os/linux/vm/os_linux.cpp
     L936:   // a user-specified value known to be greater than the 
minimum needed.
         Perhaps: ... known to be at least the minimum needed.

         As enforced by this code in os::Posix::set_minimum_stack_sizes():

         _java_thread_min_stack_allowed = 
MAX2(_java_thread_min_stack_allowed,
JavaThread::stack_guard_zone_size() +
JavaThread::stack_shadow_zone_size() +
                                               (4 * BytesPerWord 
COMPILER2_PRESENT(+ 2)) * 4 * K);

         _java_thread_min_stack_allowed = 
align_size_up(_java_thread_min_stack_allowed, vm_page_size());

         size_t stack_size_in_bytes = ThreadStackSize * K;
         if (stack_size_in_bytes != 0 &&
             stack_size_in_bytes < _java_thread_min_stack_allowed) {
           // The '-Xss' and '-XX:ThreadStackSize=N' options both set
           // ThreadStackSize so we go with "Java thread stack size" instead
           // of "ThreadStackSize" to be more friendly.
           tty->print_cr("\nThe Java thread stack size specified is too 
small. "
                         "Specify at least " SIZE_FORMAT "k",
                         _java_thread_min_stack_allowed / K);
           return JNI_ERR;
         }

     L939:   // can not do anything to emulate a larger stack than what 
has been provided by
         Typo: 'can not' -> 'cannot'

     L943:   // Mamimum stack size is the easy part, get it from 
RLIMIT_STACK
         Typo: 'Mamimum' -> 'Maximum'
         nit - please add a '.' to the end.


Thumbs up!

I don't need to see a new webrev if you decide to make the
minor edits above.

Dan



On 11/29/16 5:25 AM, David Holmes wrote:
> I just realized I overlooked the case where ThreadStackSize=0 and the 
> stack is unlimited. In that case it isn't clear where the guard pages 
> will get inserted - I do know that I don't get a stackoverflow error.
>
> This needs further investigation.
>
> David
>
> On 29/11/2016 9:59 PM, David Holmes wrote:
>> Hi Thomas,
>>
>> On 29/11/2016 8:39 PM, Thomas Stüfe wrote:
>>> Hi David,
>>>
>>> thanks for the good explanation. Change looks good, I really like the
>>> comment in capture_initial_stack().
>>>
>>> Question, with -Xss given and being smaller than current thread stack
>>> size, guard pages may appear in the middle of the invoking thread 
>>> stack?
>>> I always thought this is a bit dangerous. If your model is to have the
>>> VM created from the main thread, which then goes off to do different
>>> things, and have other threads then attach and run java code, main
>>> thread later may crash in unrelated native code just because it reached
>>> the stack depth of the hava threads? Or am I misunderstanding 
>>> something?
>>
>> There is no change to the general behaviour other than allowing a
>> primordial process thread that launches the VM, to now not have an
>> effective stack limited at 2MB. The current logic will insert guard
>> pages where ever -Xss states (as long as less than 2MB else 2MB), while
>> with the fix the guard pages will be inserted above 2MB - as dictated by
>> -Xss.
>>
>> David
>> -----
>>
>>> Thanks, Thomas
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, Nov 25, 2016 at 11:38 AM, David Holmes <david.holmes at oracle.com
>>> <mailto:david.holmes at oracle.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>>     Bug: https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8170307
>>>     <https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8170307>
>>>
>>>     The bug is not public unfortunately for non-technical reasons - but
>>>     see my eval below.
>>>
>>>     Background: if you load the JVM from the primordial thread of a
>>>     process (not done by the java launcher since JDK 6), there is an
>>>     artificial stack limit imposed on the initial thread (by sticking
>>>     the guard page at the limit position of the actual stack) of the
>>>     minimum of the -Xss setting and 2M. So if you set -Xss to > 2M 
>>> it is
>>>     ignored for the main thread even if the true stack is, say, 8M. 
>>> This
>>>     limitation dates back 10-15 years and is no longer relevant today
>>>     and should be removed (see below). I've also added additional
>>>     explanatory notes.
>>>
>>>     webrev: http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~dholmes/8170307/webrev/
>>> <http://cr.openjdk.java.net/~dholmes/8170307/webrev/>
>>>
>>>     Testing was manually done by modifying the launcher to not run the
>>>     VM in a new thread, and checking the resulting stack size used.
>>>
>>>     This change will only affect hosted JVMs launched with a -Xss value
>>>     > 2M.
>>>
>>>     Thanks,
>>>     David
>>>     -----
>>>
>>>     Bug eval:
>>>
>>>     JDK-4441425 limits the stack to 8M as a safeguard against an
>>>     unlimited value from getrlimit in 1.3.1, but further constrained
>>>     that to 2M in 1.4.0 due to JDK-4466587.
>>>
>>>     By 1.4.2 we have the basic form of the current problematic code:
>>>
>>>     #ifndef IA64
>>>       if (rlim.rlim_cur > 2 * K * K) rlim.rlim_cur = 2 * K * K;
>>>     #else
>>>       // Problem still exists RH7.2 (IA64 anyway) but 2MB is a little
>>> small
>>>       if (rlim.rlim_cur > 4 * K * K) rlim.rlim_cur = 4 * K * K;
>>>     #endif
>>>
>>>       _initial_thread_stack_size = rlim.rlim_cur & ~(page_size() - 1);
>>>
>>>       if (max_size && _initial_thread_stack_size > max_size) {
>>>          _initial_thread_stack_size = max_size;
>>>       }
>>>
>>>     This was added by JDK-4678676 to allow the stack of the main thread
>>>     to be _reduced_ below the default 2M/4M if the -Xss value was
>>>     smaller than that.** There was no intent to allow the stack size to
>>>     follow -Xss arbitrarily due to the operational constraints imposed
>>>     by the OS/glibc at the time when dealing with the primordial 
>>> process
>>>     thread.
>>>
>>>     ** It could not actually change the actual stack size of course, 
>>> but
>>>     set the guard pages to limit use to the expected stack size.
>>>
>>>     In JDK 6, under JDK-6316197, the launcher was changed to create the
>>>     JVM in a new thread, so that it was not limited by the
>>>     idiosyncracies of the OS or thread library primordial thread
>>>     handling. However, the stack size limitations remained in place in
>>>     case the VM was launched from the primordial thread of a user
>>>     application via the JNI invocation API.
>>>
>>>     I believe it should be safe to remove the 2M limitation now.
>>>
>>>



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