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Re: [Xen-devel] [PATCH 06/16] vmx: nest: handling VMX instruction exits

To: Christoph Egger <Christoph.Egger@xxxxxxx>, "xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Xen-devel] [PATCH 06/16] vmx: nest: handling VMX instruction exits
From: Keir Fraser <keir.fraser@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2010 09:23:11 +0100
Cc: Tim Deegan <Tim.Deegan@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>, "Dong, Eddie" <eddie.dong@xxxxxxxxx>, "He, Qing" <qing.he@xxxxxxxxx>
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On 15/09/2010 09:15, "Christoph Egger" <Christoph.Egger@xxxxxxx> wrote:

>> The main trick with x86_emulate extensions is determining the correct neat
>> small set of callback hooks to add, which is somewhat driven by deciding
>> what should be emulated within x86_emulate and what should be left without
>> for implementation in the caller's context.
> 
> There is a case where the host must emulate an instruction of the l2 guest
> when the l1 guest doesn't intercept it.
> 
> When the vcpu is in guest mode, the fields in struct hvm_vcpu and
> guest_cpu_user_regs() represent the l2 guest state in my patch series.
> 
> That way the instruction emulator works out-of-the box.

Well in this specific case, all VMX-related instructions executed by an L2
guest would properly cause vmexit to the L1 guest for emulation there. We
wouldn't want to emulate in Xen.

But yes I can see that emulation of L2 guest instructions is needed in some
other cases. Like instructions performing I/O in areas which L1 thinks it
has given L2 direct unmediated access to, but which Xen is actually
filtering or emulating.

 -- Keir

> You need to add instructions to the emulator that are missing there.



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