linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 13/17] watch_queue: Implement mount topology and attribute change notifications [ver #5]

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Date:   Wed, 05 Aug 2020 19:36:05 +0800
From:   Ian Kent <raven@...maw.net>
To:     Miklos Szeredi <miklos@...redi.hu>
Cc:     David Howells <dhowells@...hat.com>,
        Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
        Al Viro <viro@...iv.linux.org.uk>,
        Casey Schaufler <casey@...aufler-ca.com>,
        Stephen Smalley <sds@...ho.nsa.gov>,
        Nicolas Dichtel <nicolas.dichtel@...nd.com>,
        Christian Brauner <christian@...uner.io>, andres@...razel.de,
        Jeff Layton <jlayton@...hat.com>, dray@...hat.com,
        Karel Zak <kzak@...hat.com>, keyrings@...r.kernel.org,
        Linux API <linux-api@...r.kernel.org>,
        linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org,
        LSM <linux-security-module@...r.kernel.org>,
        linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 13/17] watch_queue: Implement mount topology and
 attribute change notifications [ver #5]

On Wed, 2020-08-05 at 09:43 +0200, Miklos Szeredi wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 5, 2020 at 3:54 AM Ian Kent <raven@...maw.net> wrote:
> > > > It's way more useful to have these in the notification than
> > > > obtainable
> > > > via fsinfo() IMHO.
> > > 
> > > What is it useful for?
> > 
> > Only to verify that you have seen all the notifications.
> > 
> > If you have to grab that info with a separate call then the count
> > isn't necessarily consistent because other notifications can occur
> > while you grab it.
> 
> No, no no.   The watch queue will signal an overflow, without any
> additional overhead for the normal case.  If you think of this as a
> protocol stack, then the overflow detection happens on the transport
> layer, instead of the application layer.  The application layer is
> responsible for restoring state in case of a transport layer error,
> but detection of that error is not the responsibility of the
> application layer.

I can see in the kernel code that an error is returned if the message
buffer is full when trying to add a message, I just can't see where
to get it in the libmount code.

That's not really a communication protocol problem.

Still I need to work out how to detect it, maybe it is seen by
the code in libmount already and I simply can't see what I need
to do to recognise it ...

So I'm stuck wanting to verify I have got everything that was
sent and am having trouble moving on from that.

Ian