[patch 04/12] xfs: cleanup xfs_log_space_wake

[Mark Tinguely]

On 01/25/12 10:10, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 23, 2012 at 01:22:22PM -0600, Mark Tinguely wrote:
>> On 01/-10/63 13:59, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
>>> Remove the now unused opportunistic parameter, and use the the
>>> xlog_writeq_wake and xlog_reserveq_wake helpers now that we don't have
>>> to care about the opportunistic wakeups.
>>>
>>> Signed-off-by: Christoph Hellwig<hch at lst.de>
>>
>> Looks good. My only concern is the way that xlog_grant_push_ail()
>> tries to kick start the writing of the log. It seems to me that a
>> combination of very large log requests could plug the log until the
>> next sync.
>
> How exactly?
>

Thanks for giving me enough rope to hang myself :)

I looked at it again and it could plug for a while, but not necessarily 
until the next sync.

I was looking at the fact that when the log is full, 
xlog_grant_push_ail() will overlap cleaning threshold lsn for a bunch of 
requests come in. This is because xlog_grant_push_ail() uses the current 
tail when calculating cleaning threshold. This cleaning overlap will 
happen until xfs_ail_push() cleans the space and the moves the log tail.

If a (unrealistically) big request sized greater than MAX(log size/4, 
256) follows some other requests then the big request determines the 
amount cleaned out of the queue. When the space is cleaned out, the 
earlier processes waiting for the log are awoken and use up the cleaned 
space, and there will not be enough space for the big request. Future 
requests will clean up to MAX(their request size, log size/4, 256). This 
will not be enough to satisfy the big request at the front of the 
request queue. We will have to wait another cleaning cycle for the tail 
to move and another log space request but even this big request would 
eventually get satisfied.




--Mark Tinguely