aboutsummaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
path: root/Documentation
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
authorDavid Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>2009-11-19 18:11:35 +0000
committerDavid Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>2009-11-19 18:11:35 +0000
commit201a15428bd54f83eccec8b7c64a04b8f9431204 (patch)
tree326fcce64ce96657253fd141a3f4a767ac95418a /Documentation
parente3d4d28b1c8cc7c26536a50b43d86ccd39878550 (diff)
FS-Cache: Handle pages pending storage that get evicted under OOM conditions
Handle netfs pages that the vmscan algorithm wants to evict from the pagecache under OOM conditions, but that are waiting for write to the cache. Under these conditions, vmscan calls the releasepage() function of the netfs, asking if a page can be discarded. The problem is typified by the following trace of a stuck process: kslowd005 D 0000000000000000 0 4253 2 0x00000080 ffff88001b14f370 0000000000000046 ffff880020d0d000 0000000000000007 0000000000000006 0000000000000001 ffff88001b14ffd8 ffff880020d0d2a8 000000000000ddf0 00000000000118c0 00000000000118c0 ffff880020d0d2a8 Call Trace: [<ffffffffa00782d8>] __fscache_wait_on_page_write+0x8b/0xa7 [fscache] [<ffffffff8104c0f1>] ? autoremove_wake_function+0x0/0x34 [<ffffffffa0078240>] ? __fscache_check_page_write+0x63/0x70 [fscache] [<ffffffffa00b671d>] nfs_fscache_release_page+0x4e/0xc4 [nfs] [<ffffffffa00927f0>] nfs_release_page+0x3c/0x41 [nfs] [<ffffffff810885d3>] try_to_release_page+0x32/0x3b [<ffffffff81093203>] shrink_page_list+0x316/0x4ac [<ffffffff8109372b>] shrink_inactive_list+0x392/0x67c [<ffffffff813532fa>] ? __mutex_unlock_slowpath+0x100/0x10b [<ffffffff81058df0>] ? trace_hardirqs_on_caller+0x10c/0x130 [<ffffffff8135330e>] ? mutex_unlock+0x9/0xb [<ffffffff81093aa2>] shrink_list+0x8d/0x8f [<ffffffff81093d1c>] shrink_zone+0x278/0x33c [<ffffffff81052d6c>] ? ktime_get_ts+0xad/0xba [<ffffffff81094b13>] try_to_free_pages+0x22e/0x392 [<ffffffff81091e24>] ? isolate_pages_global+0x0/0x212 [<ffffffff8108e743>] __alloc_pages_nodemask+0x3dc/0x5cf [<ffffffff81089529>] grab_cache_page_write_begin+0x65/0xaa [<ffffffff8110f8c0>] ext3_write_begin+0x78/0x1eb [<ffffffff81089ec5>] generic_file_buffered_write+0x109/0x28c [<ffffffff8103cb69>] ? current_fs_time+0x22/0x29 [<ffffffff8108a509>] __generic_file_aio_write+0x350/0x385 [<ffffffff8108a588>] ? generic_file_aio_write+0x4a/0xae [<ffffffff8108a59e>] generic_file_aio_write+0x60/0xae [<ffffffff810b2e82>] do_sync_write+0xe3/0x120 [<ffffffff8104c0f1>] ? autoremove_wake_function+0x0/0x34 [<ffffffff810b18e1>] ? __dentry_open+0x1a5/0x2b8 [<ffffffff810b1a76>] ? dentry_open+0x82/0x89 [<ffffffffa00e693c>] cachefiles_write_page+0x298/0x335 [cachefiles] [<ffffffffa0077147>] fscache_write_op+0x178/0x2c2 [fscache] [<ffffffffa0075656>] fscache_op_execute+0x7a/0xd1 [fscache] [<ffffffff81082093>] slow_work_execute+0x18f/0x2d1 [<ffffffff8108239a>] slow_work_thread+0x1c5/0x308 [<ffffffff8104c0f1>] ? autoremove_wake_function+0x0/0x34 [<ffffffff810821d5>] ? slow_work_thread+0x0/0x308 [<ffffffff8104be91>] kthread+0x7a/0x82 [<ffffffff8100beda>] child_rip+0xa/0x20 [<ffffffff8100b87c>] ? restore_args+0x0/0x30 [<ffffffff8102ef83>] ? tg_shares_up+0x171/0x227 [<ffffffff8104be17>] ? kthread+0x0/0x82 [<ffffffff8100bed0>] ? child_rip+0x0/0x20 In the above backtrace, the following is happening: (1) A page storage operation is being executed by a slow-work thread (fscache_write_op()). (2) FS-Cache farms the operation out to the cache to perform (cachefiles_write_page()). (3) CacheFiles is then calling Ext3 to perform the actual write, using Ext3's standard write (do_sync_write()) under KERNEL_DS directly from the netfs page. (4) However, for Ext3 to perform the write, it must allocate some memory, in particular, it must allocate at least one page cache page into which it can copy the data from the netfs page. (5) Under OOM conditions, the memory allocator can't immediately come up with a page, so it uses vmscan to find something to discard (try_to_free_pages()). (6) vmscan finds a clean netfs page it might be able to discard (possibly the one it's trying to write out). (7) The netfs is called to throw the page away (nfs_release_page()) - but it's called with __GFP_WAIT, so the netfs decides to wait for the store to complete (__fscache_wait_on_page_write()). (8) This blocks a slow-work processing thread - possibly against itself. The system ends up stuck because it can't write out any netfs pages to the cache without allocating more memory. To avoid this, we make FS-Cache cancel some writes that aren't in the middle of actually being performed. This means that some data won't make it into the cache this time. To support this, a new FS-Cache function is added fscache_maybe_release_page() that replaces what the netfs releasepage() functions used to do with respect to the cache. The decisions fscache_maybe_release_page() makes are counted and displayed through /proc/fs/fscache/stats on a line labelled "VmScan". There are four counters provided: "nos=N" - pages that weren't pending storage; "gon=N" - pages that were pending storage when we first looked, but weren't by the time we got the object lock; "bsy=N" - pages that we ignored as they were actively being written when we looked; and "can=N" - pages that we cancelled the storage of. What I'd really like to do is alter the behaviour of the cancellation heuristics, depending on how necessary it is to expel pages. If there are plenty of other pages that aren't waiting to be written to the cache that could be ejected first, then it would be nice to hold up on immediate cancellation of cache writes - but I don't see a way of doing that. Signed-off-by: David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>
Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation')
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/caching/fscache.txt4
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/caching/netfs-api.txt21
2 files changed, 24 insertions, 1 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/caching/fscache.txt b/Documentation/filesystems/caching/fscache.txt
index 057a3c71d52..7097fd29fb3 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/caching/fscache.txt
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/caching/fscache.txt
@@ -272,6 +272,10 @@ proc files.
pgs=N Number of pages given store req processing time
rxd=N Number of store reqs deleted from tracking tree
olm=N Number of store reqs over store limit
+ VmScan nos=N Number of release reqs against pages with no pending store
+ gon=N Number of release reqs against pages stored by time lock granted
+ bsy=N Number of release reqs ignored due to in-progress store
+ can=N Number of page stores cancelled due to release req
Ops pend=N Number of times async ops added to pending queues
run=N Number of times async ops given CPU time
enq=N Number of times async ops queued for processing
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/caching/netfs-api.txt b/Documentation/filesystems/caching/netfs-api.txt
index 2666b1ed5e9..1902c57b72e 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/caching/netfs-api.txt
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/caching/netfs-api.txt
@@ -641,7 +641,7 @@ data file must be retired (see the relinquish cookie function below).
Furthermore, note that this does not cancel the asynchronous read or write
operation started by the read/alloc and write functions, so the page
-invalidation and release functions must use:
+invalidation functions must use:
bool fscache_check_page_write(struct fscache_cookie *cookie,
struct page *page);
@@ -654,6 +654,25 @@ to see if a page is being written to the cache, and:
to wait for it to finish if it is.
+When releasepage() is being implemented, a special FS-Cache function exists to
+manage the heuristics of coping with vmscan trying to eject pages, which may
+conflict with the cache trying to write pages to the cache (which may itself
+need to allocate memory):
+
+ bool fscache_maybe_release_page(struct fscache_cookie *cookie,
+ struct page *page,
+ gfp_t gfp);
+
+This takes the netfs cookie, and the page and gfp arguments as supplied to
+releasepage(). It will return false if the page cannot be released yet for
+some reason and if it returns true, the page has been uncached and can now be
+released.
+
+To make a page available for release, this function may wait for an outstanding
+storage request to complete, or it may attempt to cancel the storage request -
+in which case the page will not be stored in the cache this time.
+
+
==========================
INDEX AND DATA FILE UPDATE
==========================