[v4] VMSCAPE optimization for BHI variant

[PATCH v4 07/11] x86/vmscape: Use write_ibpb() instead of indirect_branch_prediction_barrier()

Posted by Pawan Gupta 1 week, 4 days ago

indirect_branch_prediction_barrier() is a wrapper to write_ibpb(), which
also checks if the CPU supports IBPB. For VMSCAPE, call to
indirect_branch_prediction_barrier() is only possible when CPU supports
IBPB.

Simply call write_ibpb() directly to avoid unnecessary alternative
patching.

Suggested-by: Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@linux.intel.com>
Signed-off-by: Pawan Gupta <pawan.kumar.gupta@linux.intel.com>
---
 arch/x86/include/asm/entry-common.h | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/arch/x86/include/asm/entry-common.h b/arch/x86/include/asm/entry-common.h
index c45858db16c92fc1364fb818185fba7657840991..78b143673ca72642149eb2dbf3e3e31370fe6b28 100644
--- a/arch/x86/include/asm/entry-common.h
+++ b/arch/x86/include/asm/entry-common.h
@@ -97,7 +97,7 @@ static inline void arch_exit_to_user_mode_prepare(struct pt_regs *regs,
 	/* Avoid unnecessary reads of 'x86_predictor_flush_exit_to_user' */
 	if (cpu_feature_enabled(X86_FEATURE_IBPB_EXIT_TO_USER) &&
 	    this_cpu_read(x86_predictor_flush_exit_to_user)) {
-		indirect_branch_prediction_barrier();
+		write_ibpb();
 		this_cpu_write(x86_predictor_flush_exit_to_user, false);
 	}
 }

-- 
2.34.1

Re: [PATCH v4 07/11] x86/vmscape: Use write_ibpb() instead of indirect_branch_prediction_barrier()

Posted by Nikolay Borisov 1 week, 3 days ago


On 11/20/25 08:19, Pawan Gupta wrote:
> indirect_branch_prediction_barrier() is a wrapper to write_ibpb(), which
> also checks if the CPU supports IBPB. For VMSCAPE, call to
> indirect_branch_prediction_barrier() is only possible when CPU supports
> IBPB.
> 
> Simply call write_ibpb() directly to avoid unnecessary alternative
> patching.
> 
> Suggested-by: Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@linux.intel.com>
> Signed-off-by: Pawan Gupta <pawan.kumar.gupta@linux.intel.com>

Reviewed-by: Nikolay Borisov <nik.borisov@suse.com>