22 Dec, 2011

1 commit

  • Currently, the *_global_[un]lock_online() routines are not at all synchronized
    with CPU hotplug. Soft-lockups detected as a consequence of this race was
    reported earlier at https://lkml.org/lkml/2011/8/24/185. (Thanks to Cong Meng
    for finding out that the root-cause of this issue is the race condition
    between br_write_[un]lock() and CPU hotplug, which results in the lock states
    getting messed up).

    Fixing this race by just adding {get,put}_online_cpus() at appropriate places
    in *_global_[un]lock_online() is not a good option, because, then suddenly
    br_write_[un]lock() would become blocking, whereas they have been kept as
    non-blocking all this time, and we would want to keep them that way.

    So, overall, we want to ensure 3 things:
    1. br_write_lock() and br_write_unlock() must remain as non-blocking.
    2. The corresponding lock and unlock of the per-cpu spinlocks must not happen
    for different sets of CPUs.
    3. Either prevent any new CPU online operation in between this lock-unlock, or
    ensure that the newly onlined CPU does not proceed with its corresponding
    per-cpu spinlock unlocked.

    To achieve all this:
    (a) We introduce a new spinlock that is taken by the *_global_lock_online()
    routine and released by the *_global_unlock_online() routine.
    (b) We register a callback for CPU hotplug notifications, and this callback
    takes the same spinlock as above.
    (c) We maintain a bitmap which is close to the cpu_online_mask, and once it is
    initialized in the lock_init() code, all future updates to it are done in
    the callback, under the above spinlock.
    (d) The above bitmap is used (instead of cpu_online_mask) while locking and
    unlocking the per-cpu locks.

    The callback takes the spinlock upon the CPU_UP_PREPARE event. So, if the
    br_write_lock-unlock sequence is in progress, the callback keeps spinning,
    thus preventing the CPU online operation till the lock-unlock sequence is
    complete. This takes care of requirement (3).

    The bitmap that we maintain remains unmodified throughout the lock-unlock
    sequence, since all updates to it are managed by the callback, which takes
    the same spinlock as the one taken by the lock code and released only by the
    unlock routine. Combining this with (d) above, satisfies requirement (2).

    Overall, since we use a spinlock (mentioned in (a)) to prevent CPU hotplug
    operations from racing with br_write_lock-unlock, requirement (1) is also
    taken care of.

    By the way, it is to be noted that a CPU offline operation can actually run
    in parallel with our lock-unlock sequence, because our callback doesn't react
    to notifications earlier than CPU_DEAD (in order to maintain our bitmap
    properly). And this means, since we use our own bitmap (which is stale, on
    purpose) during the lock-unlock sequence, we could end up unlocking the
    per-cpu lock of an offline CPU (because we had locked it earlier, when the
    CPU was online), in order to satisfy requirement (2). But this is harmless,
    though it looks a bit awkward.

    Debugged-by: Cong Meng
    Signed-off-by: Srivatsa S. Bhat
    Signed-off-by: Al Viro
    Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org

    Srivatsa S. Bhat
     

10 Sep, 2010

1 commit

  • lg_lock_global() currently only acquires spinlocks for online CPUs, but
    it's meant to lock all possible CPUs. Lglock-protected resources may be
    associated with removed CPUs - and, indeed, that could happen with the
    per-superblock open files lists.

    At Nick's suggestion, change for_each_online_cpu() to
    for_each_possible_cpu() to protect accesses to those resources.

    Cc: Al Viro
    Acked-by: Nick Piggin
    Signed-off-by: Jonathan Corbet
    Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds

    Jonathan Corbet
     

18 Aug, 2010

1 commit

  • lglock: introduce special lglock and brlock spin locks

    This patch introduces "local-global" locks (lglocks). These can be used to:

    - Provide fast exclusive access to per-CPU data, with exclusive access to
    another CPU's data allowed but possibly subject to contention, and to provide
    very slow exclusive access to all per-CPU data.
    - Or to provide very fast and scalable read serialisation, and to provide
    very slow exclusive serialisation of data (not necessarily per-CPU data).

    Brlocks are also implemented as a short-hand notation for the latter use
    case.

    Thanks to Paul for local/global naming convention.

    Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
    Cc: Al Viro
    Cc: "Paul E. McKenney"
    Signed-off-by: Nick Piggin
    Signed-off-by: Al Viro

    Nick Piggin