linux-kernel - Re: [LSF/MM TOPIC] Discuss least bad options for resolving longterm-GUP usage by RDMA

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Date:   Wed, 6 Feb 2019 22:33:07 -0700
From:   Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@...pe.ca>
To:     Dan Williams <dan.j.williams@...el.com>
Cc:     Doug Ledford <dledford@...hat.com>,
        Dave Chinner <david@...morbit.com>,
        Christopher Lameter <cl@...ux.com>,
        Matthew Wilcox <willy@...radead.org>, Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>,
        Ira Weiny <ira.weiny@...el.com>,
        lsf-pc@...ts.linux-foundation.org,
        linux-rdma <linux-rdma@...r.kernel.org>,
        Linux MM <linux-mm@...ck.org>,
        Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
        John Hubbard <jhubbard@...dia.com>,
        Jerome Glisse <jglisse@...hat.com>,
        Michal Hocko <mhocko@...nel.org>,
        linux-nvdimm <linux-nvdimm@...ts.01.org>
Subject: Re: [LSF/MM TOPIC] Discuss least bad options for resolving
 longterm-GUP usage by RDMA

On Wed, Feb 06, 2019 at 04:22:16PM -0800, Dan Williams wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 6, 2019 at 3:41 PM Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@...pe.ca> wrote:
> [..]
> > > You're describing the current situation, i.e. Linux already implements
> > > this, it's called Device-DAX and some users of RDMA find it
> > > insufficient. The choices are to continue to tell them "no", or say
> > > "yes, but you need to submit to lease coordination".
> >
> > Device-DAX is not what I'm imagining when I say XFS--.
> >
> > I mean more like XFS with all features that require rellocation of
> > blocks disabled.
> >
> > Forbidding hold punch, reflink, cow, etc, doesn't devolve back to
> > device-dax.
> 
> True, not all the way, but the distinction loses significance as you
> lose fs features.
> 
> Filesystems mark DAX functionality experimental [1] precisely because
> it forbids otherwise typical operations that work in the nominal page
> cache case. An approach that says "lets cement the list of things a
> filesystem or a core-memory-mangement facility can't do because RDMA
> finds it awkward" is bad precedent. 

I'm not saying these rules should apply globaly.

I'm suggesting you could have a FS that supports gup_longterm by
design, and a FS that doesn't. And that is OK. They can have different
rules.

Obviously the golden case here is to use ODP (which doesn't call
gup_longterm at all) - that works for both.

Supporting non-ODP is a trade off case - users that want to run on
limited HW must accept limited functionality. Limited functionality is
better than no-funtionality.

Linux has many of these user-choose tradeoffs. This is how it supports
such a wide range of HW capabilities. Not all HW can do all
things. Some features really do need HW support. It has always been
that way.

Jason