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Add v8::Locker, v8::Unlocker, and UnenteredIsolate bindings#1896

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max-lt wants to merge 5 commits intodenoland:mainfrom
max-lt:locker
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Add v8::Locker, v8::Unlocker, and UnenteredIsolate bindings#1896
max-lt wants to merge 5 commits intodenoland:mainfrom
max-lt:locker

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@max-lt
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@max-lt max-lt commented Jan 10, 2026

Adds bindings for multi-threaded isolate pooling, enabling architectures like Cloudflare Workers.

Changes

  • UnenteredIsolate: New isolate type without auto-enter, removes LIFO drop constraint
  • v8::Locker: Acquires exclusive thread access to an isolate
  • v8::Unlocker: Temporarily releases a lock
  • unsafe impl Send for UnenteredIsolate (safe with Locker)

Key Features

  • Drop isolates in any order (no LIFO panic)
  • Share isolates across threads with Arc<Mutex<UnenteredIsolate>>
  • <10µs warm start vs ~3-5ms creating new isolates
  • 10,000+ req/s throughput per cached isolate

Tests

Note: Each thread must call unsafe { isolate.enter() } before use to setup V8's thread-local state.

No breaking changes - all new APIs

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CLAassistant commented Jan 10, 2026

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@devsnek
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devsnek commented Jan 10, 2026

To make this actually safe, v8::UnenteredIsolate can not deref into v8::Isolate. I would suggest that v8::Locker::new() accepts an &mut UnenteredIsolate and derefs into v8::Isolate instead. v8::Unlocker is also a huge can of worms wrt aliasing. I'd suggest leaving it out for now.

Also, v8::Locker internals don't belong in scope code, and you don't really need to make separate raw types for them. You should also avoid hard-coding sizes like [usize; 2]. In binding.hpp you can expose either v8::Locker, or the size of v8::Locker if exposing v8::Locker is too complex for bindgen.

Also, these ai generated comments and pr descriptions are really fucking annoying. You need to take responsibility for what you are submitting, rather than just assuming claude will be correct. unsafe impl Send for UnenteredIsolate (safe with Locker) is wrong! Regardless of what the comment says, the drop implementation of UnenteredIsolate is unsound!

@max-lt
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max-lt commented Jan 10, 2026

Will rework, thanks for the review

@max-lt
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max-lt commented Jan 12, 2026

Applied requested changes. Let me know if I missed anything.

@RainyPixel
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I would also like to help with MR. Do you need any help, or can I contribute to speed up the merge with the main code?

@max-lt
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max-lt commented Jan 29, 2026

Thanks @RainyPixel for offering help! I'd really appreciate it.

Honestly, what I need most right now is a thorough code review. I believe the current implementation addresses @devsnek's safety concerns, but having fresh eyes on it would really help move this forward.

In the meantime, we maintain a working fork at https://github.com/openworkers/rusty-v8 (currently at v145 with ptrcomp & sandbox feature flags) that we use in production for https://github.com/openworkers/openworkers-runner. It's also published on crates.io as https://crates.io/crates/openworkers-v8. The isolate pooling works well for our use case. Feel free to check it out if you want to see the implementation in action.

- Add IsolateExitGuard to ensure v8::Isolate::Exit is called if panic
  occurs during Locker::new() after Enter has been called
- Add comprehensive documentation for Locker and UnenteredIsolate
  including thread safety guarantees and usage examples
- Add debug_assert to verify no Locker is held when dropping UnenteredIsolate
- Add UnenteredIsolate::as_raw() method for low-level access
- Expand test coverage:
  - locker_state_preserved_across_locks
  - locker_drop_releases_lock
  - unentered_isolate_as_raw
  - locker_send_isolate_between_threads (verifies Send trait works)

This improves safety guarantees for multi-threaded isolate usage.
Add compile_fail tests to ensure Rust's type system prevents misuse:
- locker_double_borrow: prevents creating two Lockers simultaneously
- locker_not_send: Locker cannot be sent to another thread
- locker_scope_outlives: HandleScope cannot outlive its Locker

Add comprehensive unsafe documentation to raw::Locker:
- Document memory layout and size requirements
- Document all safety invariants for initialization
- Document thread affinity requirements

Improve runtime tests:
- Fix lifetime issues in locker_send_isolate_between_threads
- Simplify locker_state_preserved_across_locks test

All 9 runtime tests and 15 compile_fail tests pass.
@max-lt
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max-lt commented Jan 31, 2026

@RainyPixel's follow-up commit adds panic safety for the Locker::new() initialization path and some compile-time safety tests.

Ready for review when you have time.

V8's Isolate::Enter()/Exit() manage a per-isolate entry_stack_ that
stores the "previous isolate" at each nesting level. When multiple
Lockers coexist on the same thread (cooperative scheduling via
spawn_local), non-LIFO drop ordering causes Exit() to restore a stale
pointer, leading to a NULL dereference on the next Enter().

Fix: Locker now acquires only the V8 mutex (pure mutex). It temporarily
enters the isolate during construction so the C++ Locker sees
IsCurrent()==true and sets top_level_=false, then immediately exits.
The new IsolateScope type manages Enter/Exit at fine-grained boundaries
around each synchronous V8 work block, ensuring proper nesting.

API change: callers must now call locker.enter() to get an IsolateScope
before performing V8 operations. Existing tests updated accordingly.
@max-lt
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max-lt commented Feb 22, 2026

Commit de789a7 makes Locker a pure mutex, add IsolateScope for Enter/Exit

Previous changes introduced Locker + unentered isolates to avoid OwnedIsolate's LIFO drop constraint. But the Locker itself still called Enter()/Exit() internally, which reintroduced the same LIFO constraint at the Locker level, when multiple Lockers for different isolates coexist on the same thread (async pool), dropping them out of order still corrupts the entry stack.

Last fix completes the decoupling:

  • Locker → pure mutex. No more Enter/Exit.
  • IsolateScope (new) → RAII Enter()/Exit(), short-lived around each synchronous V8 block, always properly nested.
  let locker = v8::Locker::new(&mut isolate);   // mutex only
  let _scope = locker.enter();                  // Enter(isolate)
  // ... V8 work ...
  // _scope dropped → Exit(isolate), before any await
  // locker dropped → unlock mutex, safe in any order

Tests: 10 safety tests (non-LIFO drop, concurrent lockers, stress) + 6 IsolateScope tests (interleaved isolates, round-robin).

The Enter+Exit calls before Locker::Initialize() were a no-op.
The C++ Locker only checks IsLockedByCurrentThread() and
RestoreThread(), neither of which depends on the entry stack.
top_level_ is always true in our usage (no Locker/Unlocker nesting).

Also fix incorrect doc comments claiming the isolate must be in
"entered" state for raw::Locker::init().
@max-lt
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max-lt commented Feb 23, 2026

de789a7 called Enter()/Exit() during Locker construction, attempting to influence top_level_ in the C++ Locker. This was unnecessary, Locker::Initialize() determines top_level_ via RestoreThread() (archived thread state from Unlocker pairs), not via the entry stack. Since we never use Unlocker, top_level_ is always true, which correctly calls FreeThreadResources() on drop.

5b42bdd Removed the dead Enter/Exit calls and the IsolateExitGuard. No behavioral change.

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4 participants