This is the minimal sequence that jams the allocator:

void *p, *q, *r;
p = alloc_bootmem(PAGE_SIZE);
q = alloc_bootmem(64);
free_bootmem(p, PAGE_SIZE);
p = alloc_bootmem(PAGE_SIZE);
r = alloc_bootmem(64);

after this sequence (assuming that the allocator was empty or page-aligned
before), pointer "q" will be equal to pointer "r".

What's hapenning inside the allocator:
p = alloc_bootmem(PAGE_SIZE);
in allocator: last_end_off == PAGE_SIZE, bitmap contains bits 10000...
q = alloc_bootmem(64);
in allocator: last_end_off == PAGE_SIZE + 64, bitmap contains 11000...
free_bootmem(p, PAGE_SIZE);
in allocator: last_end_off == PAGE_SIZE + 64, bitmap contains 01000...
p = alloc_bootmem(PAGE_SIZE);
in allocator: last_end_off == PAGE_SIZE, bitmap contains 11000...
r = alloc_bootmem(64);

and now:

it finds bit "2", as a place where to allocate (sidx)

it hits the condition

if (bdata->last_end_off && PFN_DOWN(bdata->last_end_off) + 1 == sidx))
start_off = ALIGN(bdata->last_end_off, align);

-you can see that the condition is true, so it assigns start_off =
ALIGN(bdata->last_end_off, align); (that is PAGE_SIZE) and allocates
over already allocated block.

With the patch it tries to continue at the end of previous allocation only
if the previous allocation ended in the middle of the page.

Signed-off-by: Mikulas Patocka <mpatocka@redhat.com>
Acked-by: Johannes Weiner <hannes@saeurebad.de>
Cc: David Miller <davem@davemloft.net>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>