linux-kernel - Re: [RFC/PATCH] debug workqueue deadlocks with lockdep

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Date:	Tue, 3 Jul 2007 21:31:12 +0400
From:	Oleg Nesterov <oleg@...sign.ru>
To:	Johannes Berg <johannes@...solutions.net>
Cc:	Ingo Molnar <mingo@...hat.com>,
	Arjan van de Ven <arjan@...ux.intel.com>,
	Linux Kernel list <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	linux-wireless <linux-wireless@...r.kernel.org>,
	Peter Zijlstra <a.p.zijlstra@...llo.nl>, mingo@...e.hu,
	Thomas Sattler <tsattler@....de>
Subject: Re: [RFC/PATCH] debug workqueue deadlocks with lockdep

On 07/02, Johannes Berg wrote:
>
> On Sat, 2007-06-30 at 15:46 +0400, Oleg Nesterov wrote:
>
> > Johannes, could you change wait_on_work() as well? Most users of
> > flush_workqueue() should be converted to use it.

(to avoid a possible confusion: I meant, most users of flush_workqueue()
 should be converted to use cancel_work_sync/cancel_delayed_work_sync
 which in turn use wait_on_work()).

> I think this could lead to false positives, but then I think we
> shouldn't care about those. Let me explain. The thing is that with this
> it can happen that the code using the workqueue somehow obeys an
> ordering in the work it queues, so as far as I can tell it'd be fine to
> have two work items A and B where only B takes a lock L1, and then have
> a wait_on_work(A) under L1, if and only if B was always queued right
> after A (or something like that).

Not sure I understand. Yes, we can have false positives, but I think the
ordering in the workqueue doesn't matter.

If A does NOT take a lock L1, then it is OK to do cancel_work_sync(A)
under L1, regardless of which other work_structs this workqueue has,
before or after A.

Now we have a false positive if some time we queue B into that workqueue,
and this is not good.

We can avoid this problem if we put lockdep_map into work_struct, so
that wait_on_work() "locks" work->lockdep_map, while flush_workqueue()
takes wq->lockdep_map.

But probably we don't need this right now, at least until we really
have a lot of false positives while converting from flush_workqueue()
to cancel_work_sync/cancel_delayed_work_sync.

> However, since this invariant is
> rather likely to be broken by subsequent changes to the code, I think
> such code should probably use two workqueues instead, and I doubt it
> ever happens anyway since then people could in most cases just put both
> works into one function.

Well, I am not sure, think about the shared workqueues like keventd_wq...

> Hence I included it in my patch below.

a couple of minor nits below,

> @@ -257,7 +260,9 @@ static void run_workqueue(struct cpu_wor
>
>  		BUG_ON(get_wq_data(work) != cwq);
>  		work_clear_pending(work);
> +		lock_acquire(&cwq->wq->lockdep_map, 0, 0, 0, 2, _THIS_IP_);
>  		f(work);
> +		lock_release(&cwq->wq->lockdep_map, 0, _THIS_IP_);
                                                   ^^^
Isn't it better to call lock_release() with nested == 1 ?

> +#define create_workqueue(name) \
> +({								\
> +	static struct lock_class_key __key;			\
> +	struct workqueue_struct *__wq;				\
> +								\
> +	__wq = __create_workqueue((name), 0, 0, &__key);	\
> +	__wq;							\
> +})

Why do we need __wq ?

	+#define create_workqueue(name) \
	({							\
		static struct lock_class_key __key;		\
		__create_workqueue((name), 0, 0, &__key);	\
	})

Actually, I'd suggest to rename __create_workqueue() to __create_workqueue_key(),
and then you need the only change in linux/workqueue.h

	- extern struct workqueue_struct *__create_workqueue(...);
	+ extern struct workqueue_struct *__create_workqueue_key(..., key);
	+ #define __create_workqueue(...)	\
	+	static struct lock_class_key __key;	\
	+	__create_workqueue_key(..., key);	\

but this is a matter of taste.

Btw, I think your patch found a real bug in net/mac80211/, cool!

Oleg.

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