On Fri, 23 Mar 2012, Andrew Morton wrote: > On Fri, 23 Mar 2012 14:14:54 -0700 (PDT) > Hugh Dickins <hughd@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On Fri, 23 Mar 2012, Andrew Morton wrote: > > > > > > --- a/mm/truncate.c~mm-for-fs-add-truncate_pagecache_range-fix > > > +++ a/mm/truncate.c > > > @@ -639,6 +639,9 @@ int vmtruncate_range(struct inode *inode > > > * with on-disk format, and the filesystem would not have to deal with > > > * situations such as writepage being called for a page that has already > > > * had its underlying blocks deallocated. > > > + * > > > + * Must be called with inode->i_mapping->i_mutex held. > > > > You catch me offguard: I forget whether that's an absolute requirement or > > just commonly the case. What do the other interfaces in truncate.c say ?-) > > i_mutex is generally required, to stabilise i_size. Sorry for being quarrelsome, but I do want to Nak your followup "fix". Building a test kernel quickly told me that inode->i_mapping->i_mutex doesn't exist, of course it's inode->i_mutex. Then running the test kernel quickly told me that neither ext4 nor xfs (I didn't try ocfs2) holds inode->i_mutex where holepunching calls truncate_inode_pages_range(). Now, there might or might not be reasons why ext4 or xfs ought to hold i_mutex there for its own consistency, but it's beyond me to determine that: let's assume they're correct without evidence to the contrary. Stabilizing i_size is not a reason: holepunching does not affect i_size and is not affected by i_size (okay, ext4 still has the bug I reported a couple of months ago, whereby its holepunching stops at i_size, forgetting blocks fallocated beyond; but no doubt that will get fixed). And nothing that truncate_pagecache_range() does needs i_mutex: neither the unmap_mapping_range() nor the truncate_inode_pages_range() needs i_mutex. A year ago, yes, Miklos showed how unmap_mapping_range() was relying on mutex serialization, and added an additional mutex for that, which Peter was able to remove once he mutified i_mmap_lock. truncate_pagecache_range() is just a drop-in replacement for truncate_inode_pages_range(), and has no different locking needs. Hugh -- To unsubscribe, send a message with 'unsubscribe linux-mm' in the body to majordomo@xxxxxxxxx. For more info on Linux MM, see: http://www.linux-mm.org/ . Fight unfair telecom internet charges in Canada: sign http://stopthemeter.ca/ Don't email: <a href=mailto:"dont@xxxxxxxxx";> email@xxxxxxxxx </a>