On Thu 22-07-10 13:09:33, Wu Fengguang wrote: > writeback_inodes_wb()/__writeback_inodes_sb() are not agressive in that > they only populate b_io when necessary at entrance time. When the queued > set of inodes are all synced, they just return, possibly with > wbc.nr_to_write > 0. > > For kupdate and background writeback, there may be more eligible inodes > sitting in b_dirty when the current set of b_io inodes are completed. So > it is necessary to try another round of writeback as long as we made some > progress in this round. When there are no more eligible inodes, no more > inodes will be enqueued in queue_io(), hence nothing could/will be > synced and we may safely bail. > > This will livelock sync when there are heavy dirtiers. However in that case > sync will already be livelocked w/o this patch, as the current livelock > avoidance code is virtually a no-op (for one thing, wb_time should be > set statically at sync start time and be used in move_expired_inodes()). > The sync livelock problem will be addressed in other patches. Hmm, any reason why you don't solve this problem by just removing the condition before queue_io()? It would also make the logic simpler - always queue all inodes that are eligible for writeback... Honza > Signed-off-by: Wu Fengguang <fengguang.wu@xxxxxxxxx> > --- > fs/fs-writeback.c | 19 +++++++++++-------- > 1 file changed, 11 insertions(+), 8 deletions(-) > > --- linux-next.orig/fs/fs-writeback.c 2010-07-22 13:07:51.000000000 +0800 > +++ linux-next/fs/fs-writeback.c 2010-07-22 13:07:54.000000000 +0800 > @@ -640,20 +640,23 @@ static long wb_writeback(struct bdi_writ > wrote += MAX_WRITEBACK_PAGES - wbc.nr_to_write; > > /* > - * If we consumed everything, see if we have more > + * Did we write something? Try for more > + * > + * This is needed _before_ the b_more_io test because the > + * background writeback moves inodes to b_io and works on > + * them in batches (in order to sync old pages first). The > + * completion of the current batch does not necessarily mean > + * the overall work is done. > */ > - if (wbc.nr_to_write <= 0) > + if (wbc.nr_to_write < MAX_WRITEBACK_PAGES) > continue; > + > /* > - * Didn't write everything and we don't have more IO, bail > + * Nothing written and no more inodes for IO, bail > */ > if (list_empty(&wb->b_more_io)) > break; > - /* > - * Did we write something? Try for more > - */ > - if (wbc.nr_to_write < MAX_WRITEBACK_PAGES) > - continue; > + > /* > * Nothing written. Wait for some inode to > * become available for writeback. Otherwise > > > -- > 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 -- Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx> SUSE Labs, CR -- To unsubscribe, send a message with 'unsubscribe linux-mm' in the body to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxx For more info on Linux MM, see: http://www.linux-mm.org/ . Don't email: <a href=mailto:"dont@xxxxxxxxx";> email@xxxxxxxxx </a>