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authorPaul E. McKenney <paulmck@kernel.org>2026-08-14 15:43:51 -0700
committerPaul E. McKenney <paulmck@kernel.org>2026-08-14 15:43:51 -0700
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Merge branches 'expcb.2026.07.24a', 'misc.2026.07.30a', 'rcu-tasks.2026.07.30a', 'srcu.2026.08.11a' and 'torture.2026.08.14a' into HEADgrafted
Changes: Make expedited grace periods expedite normal RCU callbacks Miscellaneous fixes: * Improve diagnostic output with character task states. * Mark accesses to inform KCSAN of concurrency design. * Move from kmalloc() to kmalloc_obj(). * Documentation updates. * Improve handling of RCU deferred quiescent states. * Clean up unused function arguments and structure fields. * Reduce show_rcu_gp_kthreads() stack space. Tasks RCU updates: * Clean up after SRCU re-implementation of Tasks Trace RCU. * Mark accesses to inform KCSAN of concurrency design. * Add ->lazy_timer status to diagnostic output. * Remove an unnecessary memory barrier. * Fix a data race, courtesy of KCSAN. * Documentation updates. * Convert cond_resched_tasks_rcu_qs() from macro to static inline function. SRCU updates: * Add Rust helpers for SRCU. * Avoid losing queued work at cleanup_srcu_struct() time. Torture-test updates: * Preparation work for immediate RCU priority deboosting. * Test RCU readers from real interrupt handlers (as opposed to softirq). * Simplify code through use of cpumask_next_wrap(). * Improve diagnostic output with character task states. * Add rcutorture.nwriters parameter to allow lightweight stall testing, and rcutorture.stall_only to make doing so easier. * Test an RCU Tasks Trace grace period implying an RCU grace period. * Make RCU Tasks Trace torturing track reader batches. * Fix a data race, courtesy of KCSAN. * Plug a shuffle_tmp_mask memory leak on kthread spawn failure.
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+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
+
+==========================
+Frequently Asked Questions
+==========================
+
+How is this different from Autotest, kselftest, and so on?
+==========================================================
+KUnit is a unit testing framework. Autotest, kselftest (and some others) are
+not.
+
+A `unit test <https://martinfowler.com/bliki/UnitTest.html>`_ is supposed to
+test a single unit of code in isolation and hence the name *unit test*. A unit
+test should be the finest granularity of testing and should allow all possible
+code paths to be tested in the code under test. This is only possible if the
+code under test is small and does not have any external dependencies outside of
+the test's control like hardware.
+
+There are no testing frameworks currently available for the kernel that do not
+require installing the kernel on a test machine or in a virtual machine. All
+testing frameworks require tests to be written in userspace and run on the
+kernel under test. This is true for Autotest, kselftest, and some others,
+disqualifying any of them from being considered unit testing frameworks.
+
+Does KUnit support running on architectures other than UML?
+===========================================================
+
+Yes, mostly.
+
+For the most part, the KUnit core framework (what we use to write the tests)
+can compile to any architecture. It compiles like just another part of the
+kernel and runs when the kernel boots, or when built as a module, when the
+module is loaded. However, there is infrastructure, like the KUnit Wrapper
+(``tools/testing/kunit/kunit.py``) that might not support some architectures
+(see :ref:`kunit-on-qemu`).
+
+In short, yes, you can run KUnit on other architectures, but it might require
+more work than using KUnit on UML.
+
+For more information, see :ref:`kunit-on-non-uml`.
+
+.. _kinds-of-tests:
+
+What is the difference between a unit test and other kinds of tests?
+====================================================================
+Most existing tests for the Linux kernel would be categorized as an integration
+test, or an end-to-end test.
+
+- A unit test is supposed to test a single unit of code in isolation. A unit
+ test should be the finest granularity of testing and, as such, allows all
+ possible code paths to be tested in the code under test. This is only possible
+ if the code under test is small and does not have any external dependencies
+ outside of the test's control like hardware.
+- An integration test tests the interaction between a minimal set of components,
+ usually just two or three. For example, someone might write an integration
+ test to test the interaction between a driver and a piece of hardware, or to
+ test the interaction between the userspace libraries the kernel provides and
+ the kernel itself. However, one of these tests would probably not test the
+ entire kernel along with hardware interactions and interactions with the
+ userspace.
+- An end-to-end test usually tests the entire system from the perspective of the
+ code under test. For example, someone might write an end-to-end test for the
+ kernel by installing a production configuration of the kernel on production
+ hardware with a production userspace and then trying to exercise some behavior
+ that depends on interactions between the hardware, the kernel, and userspace.
+
+KUnit is not working, what should I do?
+=======================================
+
+Unfortunately, there are a number of things which can break, but here are some
+things to try.
+
+1. Run ``./tools/testing/kunit/kunit.py run`` with the ``--raw_output``
+ parameter. This might show details or error messages hidden by the kunit_tool
+ parser.
+2. Instead of running ``kunit.py run``, try running ``kunit.py config``,
+ ``kunit.py build``, and ``kunit.py exec`` independently. This can help track
+ down where an issue is occurring. (If you think the parser is at fault, you
+ can run it manually against ``stdin`` or a file with ``kunit.py parse``.)
+3. Running the UML kernel directly can often reveal issues or error messages,
+ ``kunit_tool`` ignores. This should be as simple as running ``./vmlinux``
+ after building the UML kernel (for example, by using ``kunit.py build``).
+ Note that UML has some unusual requirements (such as the host having a tmpfs
+ filesystem mounted), and has had issues in the past when built statically and
+ the host has KASLR enabled. (On older host kernels, you may need to run
+ ``setarch `uname -m` -R ./vmlinux`` to disable KASLR.)
+4. Make sure the kernel .config has ``CONFIG_KUNIT=y`` and at least one test
+ (e.g. ``CONFIG_KUNIT_EXAMPLE_TEST=y``). kunit_tool will keep its .config
+ around, so you can see what config was used after running ``kunit.py run``.
+ It also preserves any config changes you might make, so you can
+ enable/disable things with ``make ARCH=um menuconfig`` or similar, and then
+ re-run kunit_tool.
+5. Try to run ``make ARCH=um defconfig`` before running ``kunit.py run``. This
+ may help clean up any residual config items which could be causing problems.
+6. Finally, try running KUnit outside UML. KUnit and KUnit tests can be
+ built into any kernel, or can be built as a module and loaded at runtime.
+ Doing so should allow you to determine if UML is causing the issue you're
+ seeing. When tests are built-in, they will execute when the kernel boots, and
+ modules will automatically execute associated tests when loaded. Test results
+ can be collected from ``/sys/kernel/debug/kunit/<test suite>/results``, and
+ can be parsed with ``kunit.py parse``. For more details, see :ref:`kunit-on-qemu`.
+
+If none of the above tricks help, you are always welcome to email any issues to
+kunit-dev@googlegroups.com.