[PATCH net v3 3/5] ptp: vclock: propagate physical clock sampling errors

COOLING5d SUPERSEDED

From: James Hilliard <hidden>
Date: 2026-10-13 19:19:52
Also in: lkml
Subsystem: networking drivers, ptp hardware clock support, ptp virtual clock support, the rest · Maintainers: Andrew Lunn, "David S. Miller", Eric Dumazet, Jakub Kicinski, Paolo Abeni, Richard Cochran, Yangbo Lu, Linus Torvalds

Revision v3 of 2 in this series.

Revisions (2)

2026-10-13 v3 current
2026-10-15 v4 [diff vs current]

The cyclecounter read callback cannot report errors. ptp_vclock_read()
ignores the return from the physical clock and consumes its output even
if the read failed. A zero sample followed by the real counter can add
an extra 32-bit wrap to virtual time. This was found by code inspection
of reset-time PHC access and the virtual clock callers.

Sample the parent before calling timecounter_read() or timecounter_init()
and have the cyclecounter callback return the cached successful sample.
On failure, leave the counter and frequency adjustment unchanged and
return the PHC error to the caller. The refresh worker can retry later
without consuming an invalid sample.

Take the initial sample and initialize the counter before publishing the
clock. Return an error pointer from registration and propagate its errno
through n_vclocks, including when the initial sample fails.

Keep the existing cyclecounter mask, scaling and refresh interval. This
does not recover elapsed time if sampling is unavailable long enough to
miss a counter wrap, nor does it assume that getcycles64() exposes a
full-width nanosecond counter.

Fixes: 5d43f951b1ac ("ptp: add ptp virtual clock driver framework")
Signed-off-by: James Hilliard <redacted>
---
 drivers/ptp/ptp_private.h |  3 ++-
 drivers/ptp/ptp_sysfs.c   |  4 ++-
 drivers/ptp/ptp_vclock.c  | 66 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++--------------
 3 files changed, 52 insertions(+), 21 deletions(-)

diff --git a/drivers/ptp/ptp_private.h b/drivers/ptp/ptp_private.h
index ec8633126d6b..e389e0653afd 100644
--- a/drivers/ptp/ptp_private.h
+++ b/drivers/ptp/ptp_private.h

@@ -81,7 +81,8 @@ struct ptp_vclock {
 	struct hlist_node vclock_hash_node;
 	struct cyclecounter cc;
 	struct timecounter tc;
-	struct mutex lock;	/* protects tc/cc */
+	u64 cycles;
+	struct mutex lock;	/* protects tc/cc and the cached sample */
 };
 
 /*

diff --git a/drivers/ptp/ptp_sysfs.c b/drivers/ptp/ptp_sysfs.c
index fabc1c9b1752..026220b112c2 100644
--- a/drivers/ptp/ptp_sysfs.c
+++ b/drivers/ptp/ptp_sysfs.c

@@ -224,8 +224,10 @@ static ssize_t n_vclocks_store(struct device *dev,
 	if (num > ptp->n_vclocks) {
 		for (i = 0; i < num - ptp->n_vclocks; i++) {
 			vclock = ptp_vclock_register(ptp);
-			if (!vclock)
+			if (IS_ERR(vclock)) {
+				err = PTR_ERR(vclock);
 				goto err_register;
+			}
 
 			*(ptp->vclock_index + ptp->n_vclocks + i) =
 				vclock->clock->index;

diff --git a/drivers/ptp/ptp_vclock.c b/drivers/ptp/ptp_vclock.c
index 84cb527f59cc..eea207e5a889 100644
--- a/drivers/ptp/ptp_vclock.c
+++ b/drivers/ptp/ptp_vclock.c

@@ -42,21 +42,39 @@ static void ptp_vclock_hash_del(struct ptp_vclock *vclock)
 	synchronize_srcu(&vclock_srcu);
 }
 
+/* The caller holds vclock->lock, or has not published the clock yet. */
+static int ptp_vclock_sample(struct ptp_vclock *vclock)
+{
+	struct ptp_clock *ptp = vclock->pclock;
+	struct timespec64 ts;
+	int err;
+
+	err = ptp->info->getcycles64(ptp->info, &ts);
+	if (!err)
+		vclock->cycles = timespec64_to_ns(&ts);
+
+	return err;
+}
+
 static int ptp_vclock_adjfine(struct ptp_clock_info *ptp, long scaled_ppm)
 {
 	struct ptp_vclock *vclock = info_to_vclock(ptp);
 	s64 adj;
+	int err;
 
 	adj = (s64)scaled_ppm << PTP_VCLOCK_FADJ_SHIFT;
 	adj = div_s64(adj, PTP_VCLOCK_FADJ_DENOMINATOR);
 
 	if (mutex_lock_interruptible(&vclock->lock))
 		return -EINTR;
-	timecounter_read(&vclock->tc);
-	vclock->cc.mult = PTP_VCLOCK_CC_MULT + adj;
+	err = ptp_vclock_sample(vclock);
+	if (!err) {
+		timecounter_read(&vclock->tc);
+		vclock->cc.mult = PTP_VCLOCK_CC_MULT + adj;
+	}
 	mutex_unlock(&vclock->lock);
 
-	return 0;
+	return err;
 }
 
 static int ptp_vclock_adjtime(struct ptp_clock_info *ptp, s64 delta)

@@ -75,15 +93,16 @@ static int ptp_vclock_gettime(struct ptp_clock_info *ptp,
 			      struct timespec64 *ts)
 {
 	struct ptp_vclock *vclock = info_to_vclock(ptp);
-	u64 ns;
+	int err;
 
 	if (mutex_lock_interruptible(&vclock->lock))
 		return -EINTR;
-	ns = timecounter_read(&vclock->tc);
+	err = ptp_vclock_sample(vclock);
+	if (!err)
+		*ts = ns_to_timespec64(timecounter_read(&vclock->tc));
 	mutex_unlock(&vclock->lock);
-	*ts = ns_to_timespec64(ns);
 
-	return 0;
+	return err;
 }
 
 static int ptp_vclock_gettimex(struct ptp_clock_info *ptp,

@@ -115,13 +134,16 @@ static int ptp_vclock_settime(struct ptp_clock_info *ptp,
 {
 	struct ptp_vclock *vclock = info_to_vclock(ptp);
 	u64 ns = timespec64_to_ns(ts);
+	int err;
 
 	if (mutex_lock_interruptible(&vclock->lock))
 		return -EINTR;
-	timecounter_init(&vclock->tc, &vclock->cc, ns);
+	err = ptp_vclock_sample(vclock);
+	if (!err)
+		timecounter_init(&vclock->tc, &vclock->cc, ns);
 	mutex_unlock(&vclock->lock);
 
-	return 0;
+	return err;
 }
 
 static int ptp_vclock_getcrosststamp(struct ptp_clock_info *ptp,

@@ -174,12 +196,9 @@ static const struct ptp_clock_info ptp_vclock_info = {
 static u64 ptp_vclock_read(struct cyclecounter *cc)
 {
 	struct ptp_vclock *vclock = cc_to_vclock(cc);
-	struct ptp_clock *ptp = vclock->pclock;
-	struct timespec64 ts = {};
-
-	ptp->info->getcycles64(ptp->info, &ts);
 
-	return timespec64_to_ns(&ts);
+	/* The cyclecounter callback cannot report a failed PHC read. */
+	return vclock->cycles;
 }
 
 static const struct cyclecounter ptp_vclock_cc = {

@@ -192,10 +211,11 @@ static const struct cyclecounter ptp_vclock_cc = {
 struct ptp_vclock *ptp_vclock_register(struct ptp_clock *pclock)
 {
 	struct ptp_vclock *vclock;
+	int err;
 
 	vclock = kzalloc_obj(*vclock);
 	if (!vclock)
-		return NULL;
+		return ERR_PTR(-ENOMEM);
 
 	vclock->pclock = pclock;
 	vclock->info = ptp_vclock_info;

@@ -214,20 +234,28 @@ struct ptp_vclock *ptp_vclock_register(struct ptp_clock *pclock)
 
 	mutex_init(&vclock->lock);
 
+	err = ptp_vclock_sample(vclock);
+	if (err)
+		goto free_vclock;
+	timecounter_init(&vclock->tc, &vclock->cc, 0);
+
 	vclock->clock = ptp_clock_register(&vclock->info, &pclock->dev);
-	if (IS_ERR_OR_NULL(vclock->clock)) {
-		kfree(vclock);
-		return NULL;
+	if (IS_ERR(vclock->clock)) {
+		err = PTR_ERR(vclock->clock);
+		goto free_vclock;
 	}
 
 	ptp_vclock_set_subclass(vclock->clock);
 
-	timecounter_init(&vclock->tc, &vclock->cc, 0);
 	ptp_schedule_worker(vclock->clock, PTP_VCLOCK_REFRESH_INTERVAL);
 
 	ptp_vclock_hash_add(vclock);
 
 	return vclock;
+
+free_vclock:
+	kfree(vclock);
+	return ERR_PTR(err);
 }
 
 void ptp_vclock_unregister(struct ptp_vclock *vclock)

-- 
2.53.0

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