linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH v2] inotify: Increase default inotify.max_user

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Date:   Thu, 29 Oct 2020 14:05:40 -0400
From:   Waiman Long <longman@...hat.com>
To:     Amir Goldstein <amir73il@...il.com>
Cc:     Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>,
        linux-fsdevel <linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org>,
        linux-kernel <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
        Luca BRUNO <lucab@...hat.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2] inotify: Increase default inotify.max_user_watches
 limit to 1048576

On 10/29/20 1:27 PM, Amir Goldstein wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 29, 2020 at 5:46 PM Waiman Long <longman@...hat.com> wrote:
>> The default value of inotify.max_user_watches sysctl parameter was set
>> to 8192 since the introduction of the inotify feature in 2005 by
>> commit 0eeca28300df ("[PATCH] inotify"). Today this value is just too
>> small for many modern usage. As a result, users have to explicitly set
>> it to a larger value to make it work.
>>
>> After some searching around the web, these are the
>> inotify.max_user_watches values used by some projects:
>>   - vscode:  524288
>>   - dropbox support: 100000
>>   - users on stackexchange: 12228
>>   - lsyncd user: 2000000
>>   - code42 support: 1048576
>>   - monodevelop: 16384
>>   - tectonic: 524288
>>   - openshift origin: 65536
>>
>> Each watch point adds an inotify_inode_mark structure to an inode to
>> be watched. It also pins the watched inode as well as an inotify fdinfo
>> procfs file.
>>
>> Modeled after the epoll.max_user_watches behavior to adjust the default
>> value according to the amount of addressable memory available, make
>> inotify.max_user_watches behave in a similar way to make it use no more
>> than 1% of addressable memory within the range [8192, 1048576].
>>
>> For 64-bit archs, inotify_inode_mark plus 2 inode have a size close
>> to 2 kbytes. That means a system with 196GB or more memory should have
>> the maximum value of 1048576 for inotify.max_user_watches. This default
>> should be big enough for most use cases.
>>
>> With my x86-64 config, the size of xfs_inode, proc_inode and
>> inotify_inode_mark is 1680 bytes. The estimated INOTIFY_WATCH_COST is
>> 1760 bytes.
>>
>> [v2: increase inotify watch cost as suggested by Amir and Honza]
>>
>> Signed-off-by: Waiman Long <longman@...hat.com>
>> ---
>>   fs/notify/inotify/inotify_user.c | 24 +++++++++++++++++++++++-
>>   1 file changed, 23 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
>>
>> diff --git a/fs/notify/inotify/inotify_user.c b/fs/notify/inotify/inotify_user.c
>> index 186722ba3894..37d9f09c226f 100644
>> --- a/fs/notify/inotify/inotify_user.c
>> +++ b/fs/notify/inotify/inotify_user.c
>> @@ -37,6 +37,16 @@
>>
>>   #include <asm/ioctls.h>
>>
>> +/*
>> + * An inotify watch requires allocating an inotify_inode_mark structure as
>> + * well as pinning the watched inode and adding inotify fdinfo procfs file.
> Maybe you misunderstood me.
> There is no procfs file per watch.
> There is a procfs file per inotify_init() fd.
> The fdinfo of that procfile lists all the watches of that inotify instance.
Thanks for the clarification. Yes, I probably had misunderstood you 
because of the 2 * sizeof(inode) figure you provided.
>> + * The increase in size of a filesystem inode versus a VFS inode varies
>> + * depending on the filesystem. An extra 512 bytes is added as rough
>> + * estimate of the additional filesystem inode cost.
>> + */
>> +#define INOTIFY_WATCH_COST     (sizeof(struct inotify_inode_mark) + \
>> +                                2 * sizeof(struct inode) + 512)
>> +
> I would consider going with double the sizeof inode as rough approximation for
> filesystem inode size.
>
> It is a bit less arbitrary than 512 and it has some rationale behind it -
> Some kernel config options will grow struct inode (debug, smp)
> The same config options may also grow the filesystem part of the inode.
>
> And this approximation can be pretty accurate at times.
> For example, on Ubuntu 18.04 kernel 5.4.0:
> inode_cache        608
> nfs_inode_cache      1088
> btrfs_inode            1168
> xfs_inode              1024
> ext4_inode_cache   1096

Just to clarify, is your original 2 * sizeof(struct inode) figure 
include the filesystem inode overhead or there is an additional inode 
somewhere that I needs to go to 4 * sizeof(struct inode)?

Cheers,
Longman