linux-kernel - Re: [GIT PULL] fscache: I/O API modernisation and netfs helper library

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Date:   Tue, 9 Feb 2021 13:19:01 -0800
From:   Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>
To:     Matthew Wilcox <willy@...radead.org>
Cc:     David Howells <dhowells@...hat.com>,
        Jeff Layton <jlayton@...hat.com>,
        David Wysochanski <dwysocha@...hat.com>,
        Anna Schumaker <anna.schumaker@...app.com>,
        Trond Myklebust <trondmy@...merspace.com>,
        Steve French <sfrench@...ba.org>,
        Dominique Martinet <asmadeus@...ewreck.org>,
        Alexander Viro <viro@...iv.linux.org.uk>,
        ceph-devel@...r.kernel.org, linux-afs@...ts.infradead.org,
        linux-cachefs@...hat.com, CIFS <linux-cifs@...r.kernel.org>,
        linux-fsdevel <linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org>,
        "open list:NFS, SUNRPC, AND..." <linux-nfs@...r.kernel.org>,
        v9fs-developer@...ts.sourceforge.net,
        Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [GIT PULL] fscache: I/O API modernisation and netfs helper library

On Tue, Feb 9, 2021 at 12:21 PM Matthew Wilcox <willy@...radead.org> wrote:
>
> Yeah, I have trouble with the private2 vs fscache bit too.  I've been
> trying to persuade David that he doesn't actually need an fscache
> bit at all; he can just increment the page's refcount to prevent it
> from being freed while he writes data to the cache.

Does the code not hold a refcount already?

Honestly, the fact that writeback doesn't take a refcount, and then
has magic "if writeback is set, don't free" code in other parts of the
VM layer has been a problem already, when the wakeup ended up
"leaking" from a previous page to a new allocation.

I very much hope the fscache bit does not make similar mistakes,
because the rest of the VM will _not_ have special "if fscache is set,
then we won't do X" the way we do for writeback.

So I think the fscache code needs to hold a refcount regardless, and
that the fscache bit is set the page has to have a reference.

So what are the current lifetime rules for the fscache bit?

             Linus