linux-toradex.git/block/blk-flush.c, branch v3.3.5

blk-flush: move the queue kick into

2011-10-24T14:24:31+00:00

A dm-multipath user reported[1] a problem when trying to boot
a kernel with commit 4853abaae7e4a2af938115ce9071ef8684fb7af4
(block: fix flush machinery for stacking drivers with differring
flush flags) applied.  It turns out that an empty flush request
can be sent into blk_insert_flush.  When the BUG_ON was fixed
to allow for this, I/O on the underlying device would stall.  The
reason is that blk_insert_cloned_request does not kick the queue.
In the aforementioned commit, I had added a special case to
kick the queue if data was sent down but the queue flags did
not require a flush.  A better solution is to push the queue
kick up into blk_insert_cloned_request.

This patch, along with a follow-on which fixes the BUG_ON, fixes
the issue reported.

[1] http://www.redhat.com/archives/dm-devel/2011-September/msg00154.html

Reported-by: Christophe Saout 
Signed-off-by: Jeff Moyer 
Acked-by: Tejun Heo 

Stable note: 3.1
Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

blk-flush: fix invalid BUG_ON in blk_insert_flush

2011-10-24T14:24:30+00:00

A user reported a regression due to commit
4853abaae7e4a2af938115ce9071ef8684fb7af4 (block: fix flush
machinery for stacking drivers with differring flush flags).
Part of the problem is that blk_insert_flush required a
single bio be attached to the request.  In reality, having
no attached bio is also a valid case, as can be observed with
an empty flush.

[1] http://www.redhat.com/archives/dm-devel/2011-September/msg00154.html

Reported-by: Christophe Saout 
Signed-off-by: Jeff Moyer 

Stable note: 3.1
Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

block: fix flush machinery for stacking drivers with differring flush flags

2011-08-15T19:37:25+00:00

Commit ae1b1539622fb46e51b4d13b3f9e5f4c713f86ae, block: reimplement
FLUSH/FUA to support merge, introduced a performance regression when
running any sort of fsyncing workload using dm-multipath and certain
storage (in our case, an HP EVA).  The test I ran was fs_mark, and it
dropped from ~800 files/sec on ext4 to ~100 files/sec.  It turns out
that dm-multipath always advertised flush+fua support, and passed
commands on down the stack, where those flags used to get stripped off.
The above commit changed that behavior:

static inline struct request *__elv_next_request(struct request_queue *q)
{
        struct request *rq;

        while (1) {
-               while (!list_empty(&q->queue_head)) {
+               if (!list_empty(&q->queue_head)) {
                        rq = list_entry_rq(q->queue_head.next);
-                       if (!(rq->cmd_flags & (REQ_FLUSH | REQ_FUA)) ||
-                           (rq->cmd_flags & REQ_FLUSH_SEQ))
-                               return rq;
-                       rq = blk_do_flush(q, rq);
-                       if (rq)
-                               return rq;
+                       return rq;
                }

Note that previously, a command would come in here, have
REQ_FLUSH|REQ_FUA set, and then get handed off to blk_do_flush:

struct request *blk_do_flush(struct request_queue *q, struct request *rq)
{
        unsigned int fflags = q->flush_flags; /* may change, cache it */
        bool has_flush = fflags & REQ_FLUSH, has_fua = fflags & REQ_FUA;
        bool do_preflush = has_flush && (rq->cmd_flags & REQ_FLUSH);
        bool do_postflush = has_flush && !has_fua && (rq->cmd_flags &
        REQ_FUA);
        unsigned skip = 0;
...
        if (blk_rq_sectors(rq) && !do_preflush && !do_postflush) {
                rq->cmd_flags &= ~REQ_FLUSH;
		if (!has_fua)
			rq->cmd_flags &= ~REQ_FUA;
	        return rq;
	}

So, the flush machinery was bypassed in such cases (q->flush_flags == 0
&& rq->cmd_flags & (REQ_FLUSH|REQ_FUA)).

Now, however, we don't get into the flush machinery at all.  Instead,
__elv_next_request just hands a request with flush and fua bits set to
the scsi_request_fn, even if the underlying request_queue does not
support flush or fua.

The agreed upon approach is to fix the flush machinery to allow
stacking.  While this isn't used in practice (since there is only one
request-based dm target, and that target will now reflect the flush
flags of the underlying device), it does future-proof the solution, and
make it function as designed.

In order to make this work, I had to add a field to the struct request,
inside the flush structure (to store the original req->end_io).  Shaohua
had suggested overloading the union with rb_node and completion_data,
but the completion data is used by device mapper and can also be used by
other drivers.  So, I didn't see a way around the additional field.

I tested this patch on an HP EVA with both ext4 and xfs, and it recovers
the lost performance.  Comments and other testers, as always, are
appreciated.

Cheers,
Jeff

Signed-off-by: Jeff Moyer 
Acked-by: Tejun Heo 
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

allow blk_flush_policy to return REQ_FSEQ_DATA independent of *FLUSH

2011-08-09T18:32:09+00:00

blk_insert_flush has the following check:

	/*
	 * If there's data but flush is not necessary, the request can be
	 * processed directly without going through flush machinery.  Queue
	 * for normal execution.
	 */
	if ((policy & REQ_FSEQ_DATA) &&
	    !(policy & (REQ_FSEQ_PREFLUSH | REQ_FSEQ_POSTFLUSH))) {
		list_add_tail(&rq->queuelist, &q->queue_head);
		return;
	}

However, blk_flush_policy will not return with policy set to only
REQ_FSEQ_DATA:

static unsigned int blk_flush_policy(unsigned int fflags, struct request *rq)
{
	unsigned int policy = 0;

	if (fflags & REQ_FLUSH) {
		if (rq->cmd_flags & REQ_FLUSH)
			policy |= REQ_FSEQ_PREFLUSH;
		if (blk_rq_sectors(rq))
			policy |= REQ_FSEQ_DATA;
		if (!(fflags & REQ_FUA) && (rq->cmd_flags & REQ_FUA))
			policy |= REQ_FSEQ_POSTFLUSH;
	}
	return policy;
}

Notice that REQ_FSEQ_DATA is only set if REQ_FLUSH is set.  Fix this
mismatch by moving the setting of REQ_FSEQ_DATA outside of the REQ_FLUSH
check.

Tejun notes:

  Hmmm... yes, this can become a correctness issue if (and only if)
  blk_queue_flush() is called to change q->flush_flags while requests
  are in-flight; otherwise, requests wouldn't reach the function at all.
  Also, I think it would be a generally good idea to always set
  FSEQ_DATA if the request has data.

Cheers,
Jeff

Signed-off-by: Jeff Moyer 
Acked-by: Tejun Heo 
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

block: hold queue if flush is running for non-queueable flush drive

2011-05-06T17:36:25+00:00

In some drives, flush requests are non-queueable. When flush request is
running, normal read/write requests can't run. If block layer dispatches
such request, driver can't handle it and requeue it.  Tejun suggested we
can hold the queue when flush is running. This can avoid unnecessary
requeue.  Also this can improve performance. For example, we have
request flush1, write1, flush 2. flush1 is dispatched, then queue is
hold, write1 isn't inserted to queue. After flush1 is finished, flush2
will be dispatched. Since disk cache is already clean, flush2 will be
finished very soon, so looks like flush2 is folded to flush1.

In my test, the queue holding completely solves a regression introduced by
commit 53d63e6b0dfb95882ec0219ba6bbd50cde423794:

    block: make the flush insertion use the tail of the dispatch list

    It's not a preempt type request, in fact we have to insert it
    behind requests that do specify INSERT_FRONT.

which causes about 20% regression running a sysbench fileio
workload.

Stable: 2.6.39 only

Cc: stable@kernel.org
Signed-off-by: Shaohua Li 
Acked-by: Tejun Heo 
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

block: add blk_run_queue_async

2011-04-18T09:41:33+00:00

Instead of overloading __blk_run_queue to force an offload to kblockd
add a new blk_run_queue_async helper to do it explicitly.  I've kept
the blk_queue_stopped check for now, but I suspect it's not needed
as the check we do when the workqueue items runs should be enough.

Signed-off-by: Christoph Hellwig 
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

block: make the flush insertion use the tail of the dispatch list

2011-04-05T21:51:37+00:00

It's not a preempt type request, in fact we have to insert it
behind requests that do specify INSERT_FRONT.

Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

block: get rid of elv_insert() interface

2011-04-05T21:51:37+00:00

Merge it with __elv_add_request(), it's pretty pointless to
have a function with only two callers. The main interface
is elv_add_request()/__elv_add_request().

Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

Merge branch 'for-2.6.39/stack-plug' into for-2.6.39/core

2011-03-10T07:58:35+00:00

Conflicts:
	block/blk-core.c
	block/blk-flush.c
	drivers/md/raid1.c
	drivers/md/raid10.c
	drivers/md/raid5.c
	fs/nilfs2/btnode.c
	fs/nilfs2/mdt.c

Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe

block: remove per-queue plugging

2011-03-10T07:52:07+00:00

Code has been converted over to the new explicit on-stack plugging,
and delay users have been converted to use the new API for that.
So lets kill off the old plugging along with aops->sync_page().

Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe