Can I make a question ? On Wed, 23 Nov 2011 14:34:16 +0100 Johannes Weiner <hannes@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > + /* > + * When allocating a page cache page for writing, we > + * want to get it from a zone that is within its dirty > + * limit, such that no single zone holds more than its > + * proportional share of globally allowed dirty pages. > + * The dirty limits take into account the zone's > + * lowmem reserves and high watermark so that kswapd > + * should be able to balance it without having to > + * write pages from its LRU list. > + * > + * This may look like it could increase pressure on > + * lower zones by failing allocations in higher zones > + * before they are full. But the pages that do spill > + * over are limited as the lower zones are protected > + * by this very same mechanism. It should not become > + * a practical burden to them. > + * > + * XXX: For now, allow allocations to potentially > + * exceed the per-zone dirty limit in the slowpath > + * (ALLOC_WMARK_LOW unset) before going into reclaim, > + * which is important when on a NUMA setup the allowed > + * zones are together not big enough to reach the > + * global limit. The proper fix for these situations > + * will require awareness of zones in the > + * dirty-throttling and the flusher threads. > + */ > + if ((alloc_flags & ALLOC_WMARK_LOW) && > + (gfp_mask & __GFP_WRITE) && !zone_dirty_ok(zone)) > + goto this_zone_full; > > BUILD_BUG_ON(ALLOC_NO_WATERMARKS < NR_WMARK); > if (!(alloc_flags & ALLOC_NO_WATERMARKS)) { This wil call if (NUMA_BUILD) zlc_mark_zone_full(zonelist, z); And this zone will be marked as full. IIUC, zlc_clear_zones_full() is called only when direct reclaim ends. So, if no one calls direct-reclaim, 'full' mark may never be cleared even when number of dirty pages goes down to safe level ? I'm sorry if this is alread discussed. Thanks, -Kame -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-fsdevel" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html