On Fri 19-11-21 14:12:46, Chengguang Xu wrote: > ---- 在 星期五, 2021-11-19 00:43:49 Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx> 撰写 ---- > > On Thu 18-11-21 20:02:09, Chengguang Xu wrote: > > > ---- 在 星期四, 2021-11-18 19:23:15 Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx> 撰写 ---- > > > > On Thu 18-11-21 14:32:36, Chengguang Xu wrote: > > > > > > > > > > ---- 在 星期三, 2021-11-17 14:11:29 Chengguang Xu <cgxu519@xxxxxxxxxxxx> 撰写 ---- > > > > > > ---- 在 星期二, 2021-11-16 20:35:55 Miklos Szeredi <miklos@xxxxxxxxxx> 撰写 ---- > > > > > > > On Tue, 16 Nov 2021 at 03:20, Chengguang Xu <cgxu519@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > ---- 在 星期四, 2021-10-07 21:34:19 Miklos Szeredi <miklos@xxxxxxxxxx> 撰写 ---- > > > > > > > > > On Thu, 7 Oct 2021 at 15:10, Chengguang Xu <cgxu519@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > However that wasn't what I was asking about. AFAICS ->write_inode() > > > > > > > > > > > won't start write back for dirty pages. Maybe I'm missing something, > > > > > > > > > > > but there it looks as if nothing will actually trigger writeback for > > > > > > > > > > > dirty pages in upper inode. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Actually, page writeback on upper inode will be triggered by overlayfs ->writepages and > > > > > > > > > > overlayfs' ->writepages will be called by vfs writeback function (i.e writeback_sb_inodes). > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Right. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > But wouldn't it be simpler to do this from ->write_inode()? > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I.e. call write_inode_now() as suggested by Jan. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Also could just call mark_inode_dirty() on the overlay inode > > > > > > > > > regardless of the dirty flags on the upper inode since it shouldn't > > > > > > > > > matter and results in simpler logic. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Hi Miklos, > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Sorry for delayed response for this, I've been busy with another project. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > I agree with your suggesion above and further more how about just mark overlay inode dirty > > > > > > > > when it has upper inode? This approach will make marking dirtiness simple enough. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Are you suggesting that all non-lower overlay inodes should always be dirty? > > > > > > > > > > > > > > The logic would be simple, no doubt, but there's the cost to walking > > > > > > > those overlay inodes which don't have a dirty upper inode, right? > > > > > > > > > > > > That's true. > > > > > > > > > > > > > Can you quantify this cost with a benchmark? Can be totally synthetic, > > > > > > > e.g. lookup a million upper files without modifying them, then call > > > > > > > syncfs. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > No problem, I'll do some tests for the performance. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Hi Miklos, > > > > > > > > > > I did some rough tests and the results like below. In practice, I don't > > > > > think that 1.3s extra time of syncfs will cause significant problem. > > > > > What do you think? > > > > > > > > Well, burning 1.3s worth of CPU time for doing nothing seems like quite a > > > > bit to me. I understand this is with 1000000 inodes but although that is > > > > quite a few it is not unheard of. If there would be several containers > > > > calling sync_fs(2) on the machine they could easily hog the machine... That > > > > is why I was originally against keeping overlay inodes always dirty and > > > > wanted their dirtiness to at least roughly track the real need to do > > > > writeback. > > > > > > > > > > Hi Jan, > > > > > > Actually, the time on user and sys are almost same with directly excute syncfs on underlying fs. > > > IMO, it only extends syncfs(2) waiting time for perticular container but not burning cpu. > > > What am I missing? > > > > Ah, right, I've missed that only realtime changed, not systime. I'm sorry > > for confusion. But why did the realtime increase so much? Are we waiting > > for some IO? > > > > There are many places to call cond_resched() in writeback process, > so sycnfs process was scheduled several times. I was thinking about this a bit more and I don't think I buy this explanation. What I rather think is happening is that real work for syncfs (writeback_inodes_sb() and sync_inodes_sb() calls) gets offloaded to a flush worker. E.g. writeback_inodes_sb() ends up calling __writeback_inodes_sb_nr() which does: bdi_split_work_to_wbs() wb_wait_for_completion() So you don't see the work done in the times accounted to your test program. But in practice the flush worker is indeed burning 1.3s worth of CPU to scan the 1 million inode list and do nothing. Honza -- Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxxx> SUSE Labs, CR