Re: [PATCH] Prevent netpoll hanging when link is down

[Andi Kleen <ak@xxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Oct 11, 2004 at 11:58:52AM -0500, Matt Mackall wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 11, 2004 at 06:43:15PM +0200, Andi Kleen wrote:
> > > It's not recursion on printk that's a problem, it's recursion on
> > > ->poll() and attempting to take whatever internal driver locks.
> > 
> > There is no recursion on poll because printk will never call into
> > the low level console driver when the console sem is already taken.
> 
> Ergh, you deleted the context. Again, imagine we're originally in
> ->poll() for _a non-netpoll-related reason_. In other words, the
> console sem is not taken, because we're just doing routine network
> I/O. While in poll(), we take a private driver lock. Then for whatever
> reason, we printk -> netconsole -> netpoll -> poll() again where we
> attempt to retake the private driver lock.

You're right, in that case you could get a deadlock. 

-Andi