linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 14/17] writeback: make writeback_control.nr_to

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Date:	Mon, 9 May 2011 18:54:58 +0200
From:	Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>
To:	Wu Fengguang <fengguang.wu@...el.com>
Cc:	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>, Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>,
	Dave Chinner <david@...morbit.com>,
	Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org>,
	linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 14/17] writeback: make writeback_control.nr_to_write
 straight

On Fri 06-05-11 11:08:35, Wu Fengguang wrote:
> Pass struct wb_writeback_work all the way down to writeback_sb_inodes(),
> and initialize the struct writeback_control there.
> 
> struct writeback_control is basically designed to control writeback of a
> single file, but we keep abuse it for writing multiple files in
> writeback_sb_inodes() and its callers.
> 
> It immediately clean things up, e.g. suddenly wbc.nr_to_write vs
> work->nr_pages starts to make sense, and instead of saving and restoring
> pages_skipped in writeback_sb_inodes it can always start with a clean
> zero value.
> 
> It also makes a neat IO pattern change: large dirty files are now
> written in the full 4MB writeback chunk size, rather than whatever
> remained quota in wbc->nr_to_write.
> 
> Proposed-by: Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org>
> Signed-off-by: Wu Fengguang <fengguang.wu@...el.com>
...
> @@ -543,34 +588,40 @@ static int writeback_sb_inodes(struct su
>  			requeue_io(inode, wb);
>  			continue;
>  		}
> -
>  		__iget(inode);
> +		write_chunk = writeback_chunk_size(work);
> +		wbc.nr_to_write = write_chunk;
> +		wbc.pages_skipped = 0;
> +
> +		writeback_single_inode(inode, wb, &wbc);
>  
> -		pages_skipped = wbc->pages_skipped;
> -		writeback_single_inode(inode, wb, wbc);
> -		if (wbc->pages_skipped != pages_skipped) {
> +		work->nr_pages -= write_chunk - wbc.nr_to_write;
> +		wrote += write_chunk - wbc.nr_to_write;
> +		if (wbc.pages_skipped) {
>  			/*
>  			 * writeback is not making progress due to locked
>  			 * buffers.  Skip this inode for now.
>  			 */
>  			redirty_tail(inode, wb);
> -		}
> +		} else if (!(inode->i_state & I_DIRTY))
> +			wrote++;
>  		spin_unlock(&inode->i_lock);
>  		spin_unlock(&wb->list_lock);
>  		iput(inode);
>  		cond_resched();
>  		spin_lock(&wb->list_lock);
> -		if (wbc->nr_to_write <= 0)
> -			return 1;
> +		if (wrote >= MAX_WRITEBACK_PAGES)
> +			break;
  This definitely deserves a comment (as well as a similar check in
__writeback_inodes_wb()). I guess you bail out here so that we perform the
background limit check and livelocking of for_kupdate/for_background check
often enough. I'm undecided whether it's good to bail out like this. It's
not necessary in some cases (like WB_SYNC_ALL or for_sync writeback) but
OTOH moving the necessary checks here does not look ideal either...

>  void writeback_inodes_wb(struct bdi_writeback *wb,
> -		struct writeback_control *wbc)
> +			 struct writeback_control *wbc)
>  {
> +	struct wb_writeback_work work = {
> +		.nr_pages	= wbc->nr_to_write,
> +		.sync_mode	= wbc->sync_mode,
> +		.range_cyclic	= wbc->range_cyclic,
> +	};
> +
>  	spin_lock(&wb->list_lock);
>  	if (list_empty(&wb->b_io))
> -		queue_io(wb, wbc->older_than_this);
> -	__writeback_inodes_wb(wb, wbc);
> +		queue_io(wb, NULL);
> +	__writeback_inodes_wb(wb, &work);
>  	spin_unlock(&wb->list_lock);
> -}
  Hmm, maybe we should just pass in number of pages (similarly as in
writeback_inodes_sb_nr())? It would look like a cleaner interface than
passing whole writeback_control and then ignoring parts of it.

								Honza
-- 
Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>
SUSE Labs, CR
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