Skip to contentSkip to conversation

ext4 stable page writes question

DISCUSSION Dmitry Monakhov 2 participants 3 messages Apr 9, 2013

lore
Share & tools
lore
#0 lore raw

According to stable write assumptions (1d1d1a767206fb) grab_cache_page_write_begin() now calls relaxed method wait_for_stable_page() which will wait for writeback to finish only if bdi demand that. Commit message states that ext4 may not wait
But there are a lot of write-paths where we expect that:
BUG_ON(!PageLocked(page));
BUG_ON(PageWriteback(page));
And the only reason we avoid this bugon is because of commit 47564bfb95b which use following trick to avoid lock inversion over journal_start:
page = grab_cache_page_write_begin()
unlock_page(page);
ext4_journal_start()
lock_page(page);
wait_on_page_writeback(page); <<<< unconditional wait

So as far as I understand this was done just by occasion because ext4_page_mkwrite() use wait_for_stable_page().

So here is my question: Do we have to wait for page's writeback to finish for all write paths in ext4 code or we may use wait_for_stable_page() and should cleanup all places where we may trigger BUG_ON(PageWriteback(page));

#1 lore raw
Quoted 3 lines · Dmitry Monakhov

According to stable write assumptions (1d1d1a767206fb) grab_cache_page_write_begin() now calls relaxed method wait_for_stable_page() which will wait for writeback to finish only if bdi demand that.

Yes.

Quoted 4 lines

Commit message states that ext4 may not wait But there are a lot of write-paths where we expect that:
BUG_ON(!PageLocked(page)); BUG_ON(PageWriteback(page));

Really? The only places I can find are in writeback path and there we
have wait_on_page_writeback() (either in write_cache_pages() or in ext4_da_writepages()).

Quoted 7 lines

And the only reason we avoid this bugon is because of commit 47564bfb95b which use following trick to avoid lock inversion over journal_start:
page = grab_cache_page_write_begin()
unlock_page(page);
ext4_journal_start()
lock_page(page);
wait_on_page_writeback(page); <<<< unconditional wait

No, I think this is really independent. ext4 should be fine when write &
writeback are running in parallel for a page.

Quoted 7 lines

So as far as I understand this was done just by occasion because ext4_page_mkwrite() use wait_for_stable_page().

So here is my question: Do we have to wait for page's writeback to finish for all write paths in ext4 code or we may use wait_for_stable_page() and should cleanup all places where we may trigger BUG_ON(PageWriteback(page));

If there's any such place, please tell me how we could trigger it...

Honza

Signature · 2 lines
Jan Kara <[email protected]>
SUSE Labs, CR
#2 lore raw
Quoted 24 lines · Jan Kara
Quoted 3 lines · Dmitry Monakhov

According to stable write assumptions (1d1d1a767206fb) grab_cache_page_write_begin() now calls relaxed method wait_for_stable_page() which will wait for writeback to finish only if bdi demand that.

Yes.

Quoted 4 lines

Commit message states that ext4 may not wait But there are a lot of write-paths where we expect that:
BUG_ON(!PageLocked(page)); BUG_ON(PageWriteback(page));

Really? The only places I can find are in writeback path and there we
have wait_on_page_writeback() (either in write_cache_pages() or in ext4_da_writepages()).

Quoted 7 lines

And the only reason we avoid this bugon is because of commit 47564bfb95b which use following trick to avoid lock inversion over journal_start:
page = grab_cache_page_write_begin()
unlock_page(page);
ext4_journal_start()
lock_page(page);
wait_on_page_writeback(page); <<<< unconditional wait

No, I think this is really independent. ext4 should be fine when write &
writeback are running in parallel for a page.

Quoted 8 lines
Quoted 7 lines

So as far as I understand this was done just by occasion because ext4_page_mkwrite() use wait_for_stable_page().

So here is my question: Do we have to wait for page's writeback to finish for all write paths in ext4 code or we may use wait_for_stable_page() and should cleanup all places where we may trigger BUG_ON(PageWriteback(page));

If there's any such place, please tell me how we could trigger it...

move_extent.c:mext_page_mkuptodate() expect that.
IMHO it is reasonable to force behavior here even if we may not do that on other places because defragmentation code should be 101% reliable and performance is not important here.

Quoted 5 lines

Honza

Signature · 2 lines
Jan Kara <[email protected]>
SUSE Labs, CR