Good day.
Can anyone help me out please? I'm trying to create a monster software
RAID array and the kernel is not behaving. On some test hardware I can
get 17 RAID1 arrays to begin syncing and will sync with
/proc/sys/dev/raid/speed_limit_max set to 100000 (the max allowed) with
no problem.
We wanted to use 26 RAID1 arrays and then stripe across them to get very
high performance. When I tried to do that this weekend on our
production box we started getting kernel panics when the RAID1 arrays
started syncing. This was with speed_limit_max set to 10000 so the rate
wasn't very high. Since we knew 34 disks worked we decided to put the
box in to production with just 13 RAID1 arrays and striping across
those. The performance is great compared to our hardware RAID, but I
would like to get all the disks we purchase for this system working.
This morning I connected 56 disks to our test hardware and tried to
reproduce the problem. With the test hardware, the 26 RAID1 arrays were
working OK at speed_limit_max 10000 however the kernel OOPSed when I
'less'ed /proc/mdstat. It wasn't a hard crash because I could still
work. However when I upped the speed_limit_max to 30000 there was a
hard crash.
I've tried disabling Hyper Threading on these boxes with the 'noht'
kernel boot parameter, but that didn't seem to help. A lot of what's on
Google points to bad hardware, but I don't think this problem is
hardware-related. The kernels are stock Red Hat source and have
CONFIG_SD_EXTRA_DEVS set to 64 and have the megaraid2 module patches.
The output from ksymoops for both OOPS are below along with the
production and test hardware specs and kernel versions. If anyone can
aid me, please let me know. This is test hardware so I an free to try
kernel patches or anything else. If more information is needed please
let me know. I am subscribed to the RAID list, but not to the LKML so
please CC: me with responses.
Thank you so much for your assistance,
Andy.
Regards,
Andrew Rechenberg
Infrastructure Team, Sherman Financial Group
Production Hardware
--------------------
Dell PE6600
4x1.4GHz Xeon with HT
8GB RAM
2.4.18-19.7.xbigmem-SHR
ProductionHW Modules:
---------------------
Module Size Used by Not tainted
lp 8672 0 (autoclean)
parport 35648 0 (autoclean) [lp]
autofs 11620 0 (autoclean) (unused)
tg3 47200 1
raid0 4128 1 (autoclean)
raid1 15556 13 (autoclean)
loop 11184 0 (autoclean)
lvm-mod 64608 3
ext3 67360 7
jbd 51464 7 [ext3]
aic7xxx 153664 28
megaraid2 37920 7
sd_mod 12800 70
scsi_mod 110352 3 [aic7xxx megaraid2 sd_mod]
Test Hardware
-------------
Dell PE4600
2x2.4GHz Xeon with HT
4GB RAM
2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR (includes megaraid2 module)
TestHW Modules
---------------
Module Size Used by Not tainted
e100 58500 1
raid1 15556 0 (autoclean)
loop 11184 0 (autoclean)
sr_mod 16088 0 (autoclean) (unused)
cdrom 32416 0 (autoclean) [sr_mod]
usb-ohci 21856 0 (unused)
usbcore 74400 1 [usb-ohci]
lvm-mod 64608 0
aic7xxx 129856 3
sd_mod 12832 6
scsi_mod 110800 3 [sr_mod aic7xxx sd_mod]
[root@cinshrinft1 ~]# ksymoops -k /proc/ksyms /tmp/raidoops
ksymoops 2.4.4 on i686 2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR. Options used
-V (default)
-k /proc/ksyms (specified)
-l /proc/modules (default)
-o /lib/modules/2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR/ (default)
-m /boot/System.map-2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR (default)
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/lvm-mod.o) for lvm-mod
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/aic7xxx.o) for aic7xxx
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/sd_mod.o) for sd_mod
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/scsi_mod.o) for scsi_mod
ksymoops: No such file or directory
OOPS: 0000
CPU: 3
EIP: 0010 [<c0138320>] Not tainted
Using defaults from ksymoops -t elf32-i386 -a i386
EFLAGS: 00010883
eax: 5d305b21 ebx: 000000a3 ecx: 00000006 edx: c5e8a090
esi: c5e8a080 edi: 00000000 ebp: c5e5e2b4 esp: f7ffdf64
ds: 0018 es: 0018 ss: 0018
Call Trace: [<c013aa8e>] do_try_to_free_pages [kernel] 0x3e
(0xf7ffdf98))
[<c013add1>] kswapd [kernel] 0x141 (0xf7ffdfd4))
[<c0105000>] stext [kernel] 0x0 (0xf7ffdfe8))
[<c01072a6>] kernel_thread [kernel] 0x26 (0xf7ffdff0))
[<c013ac90>] kswapd [kernel] 0x0 (0xf7ffdff8))
Code: 8b 00 43 39 d0 75 f9 8b 4e 3c 89 da 8b 7e 4c d3 e2 85 ff 74
>>EIP; c0138320 <kmem_cache_reap+1d0/340> <=====
Trace; c013aa8e <do_try_to_free_pages+3e/1b0>
Trace; c013add1 <kswapd+141/390>
Trace; c0105000 <_stext+0/0>
Trace; c01072a6 <kernel_thread+26/30>
Trace; c013ac90 <kswapd+0/390>
Code; c0138320 <kmem_cache_reap+1d0/340>
00000000 <_EIP>:
Code; c0138320 <kmem_cache_reap+1d0/340> <=====
0: 8b 00 mov (%eax),%eax <=====
Code; c0138322 <kmem_cache_reap+1d2/340>
2: 43 inc %ebx
Code; c0138323 <kmem_cache_reap+1d3/340>
3: 39 d0 cmp %edx,%eax
Code; c0138325 <kmem_cache_reap+1d5/340>
5: 75 f9 jne 0 <_EIP>
Code; c0138327 <kmem_cache_reap+1d7/340>
7: 8b 4e 3c mov 0x3c(%esi),%ecx
Code; c013832a <kmem_cache_reap+1da/340>
a: 89 da mov %ebx,%edx
Code; c013832c <kmem_cache_reap+1dc/340>
c: 8b 7e 4c mov 0x4c(%esi),%edi
Code; c013832f <kmem_cache_reap+1df/340>
f: d3 e2 shl %cl,%edx
Code; c0138331 <kmem_cache_reap+1e1/340>
11: 85 ff test %edi,%edi
Code; c0138333 <kmem_cache_reap+1e3/340>
13: 74 00 je 15 <_EIP+0x15> c0138335
<kmem_cache_reap+1e5/340>
4 errors issued. Results may not be reliable.
[root@cinshrinft1 ~]# ksymoops -k /proc/ksyms /tmp/lessoops
ksymoops 2.4.4 on i686 2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR. Options used
-V (default)
-k /proc/ksyms (specified)
-l /proc/modules (default)
-o /lib/modules/2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR/ (default)
-m /boot/System.map-2.4.18-24.7.xbigmem-SHR (default)
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/lvm-mod.o) for lvm-mod
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/aic7xxx.o) for aic7xxx
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/sd_mod.o) for sd_mod
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Error (expand_objects): cannot stat(/lib/scsi_mod.o) for scsi_mod
ksymoops: No such file or directory
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: Unable to handle kernel paging
request at virtual address 0a5d306f
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: c0145084
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: *pde = 00000000
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: Oops: 0002
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: CPU: 3
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: EIP: 0010:[<c0145084>] Not
tainted
Using defaults from ksymoops -t elf32-i386 -a i386
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: EFLAGS: 00010202
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: eax: 0a5d305b ebx: eba14c80 ecx:
00000001 edx: eba14c80
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: esi: 0805db40 edi: fffffff7 ebp:
000003eb esp: eb7d3f88
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: ds: 0018 es: 0018 ss: 0018
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: Process less (pid: 6866,
stackpage=eb7d3000)
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: Stack: eb7d2000 c01440f9 0000000c
00000003 c0116a29 00000001 0805db40 c0121
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: eb7d3fac 3e6ca782 eb7d2000
0805db40 00000000 bfffe438 c0108c93 00000
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: 0805e540 000003eb 0805db40
00000000 bfffe438 00000004 0000002b 00000
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: Call Trace: [<c01440f9>] sys_write
[kernel] 0x19 (0xeb7d3f8c))
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: [<c0116a29>]
smp_apic_timer_interrupt [kernel] 0xa9 (0xeb7d3f98))
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: [<c0121e52>] sys_time [kernel] 0x12
(0xeb7d3fa4))
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: [<c0108c93>] system_call [kernel]
0x33 (0xeb7d3fc0))
Mar 10 09:56:03 cinshrinft1 kernel: Code: f0 ff 40 14 f0 ff 43 04 5b c3
89 f6 8b 4c 24 04 f0 ff 49 14
>>EIP; c0145084 <fget+34/40> <=====
Trace; c01440f9 <sys_write+19/110>
Trace; c0116a29 <smp_apic_timer_interrupt+a9/d0>
Trace; c0121e52 <sys_time+12/60>
Trace; c0108c93 <system_call+33/38>
Code; c0145084 <fget+34/40>
00000000 <_EIP>:
Code; c0145084 <fget+34/40> <=====
0: f0 ff 40 14 lock incl 0x14(%eax) <=====
Code; c0145088 <fget+38/40>
4: f0 ff 43 04 lock incl 0x4(%ebx)
Code; c014508c <fget+3c/40>
8: 5b pop %ebx
Code; c014508d <fget+3d/40>
9: c3 ret
Code; c014508e <fget+3e/40>
a: 89 f6 mov %esi,%esi
Code; c0145090 <put_filp+0/50>
c: 8b 4c 24 04 mov 0x4(%esp,1),%ecx
Code; c0145094 <put_filp+4/50>
10: f0 ff 49 14 lock decl 0x14(%ecx)
4 errors issued. Results may not be reliable.
> Can anyone help me out please? I'm trying to create a monster software
> RAID array and the kernel is not behaving. On some test hardware I can
> get 17 RAID1 arrays to begin syncing and will sync with
> /proc/sys/dev/raid/speed_limit_max set to 100000 (the max allowed) with
> no problem.
>
> We wanted to use 26 RAID1 arrays and then stripe across them to get very
> high performance. When I tried to do that this weekend on our
> production box we started getting kernel panics when the RAID1 arrays
> started syncing. This was with speed_limit_max set to 10000 so the rate
> wasn't very high. Since we knew 34 disks worked we decided to put the
> box in to production with just 13 RAID1 arrays and striping across
> those. The performance is great compared to our hardware RAID, but I
> would like to get all the disks we purchase for this system working.
>
> This morning I connected 56 disks to our test hardware and tried to
> reproduce the problem. With the test hardware, the 26 RAID1 arrays were
> working OK at speed_limit_max 10000 however the kernel OOPSed when I
> 'less'ed /proc/mdstat. It wasn't a hard crash because I could still
> work. However when I upped the speed_limit_max to 30000 there was a
> hard crash.
At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and overwriting
the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and get it to printk
how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just printk sz every time it
changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the seq_file interface.
May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what you're
doing, and it's easy to check.
M.
Martin J. Bligh wrote:
> At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
> md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and overwriting
> the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and get it to printk
> how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just printk sz every time it
> changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the seq_file interface.
>
> May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what you're
> doing, and it's easy to check.
>
> M.
I posted a patch to do exactly this last week to the Linux-RAID mailing list. If
you check the archives you should find it. This problem also occurs if you use
the device-mapper under 2.5.X, because it makes all 256 md minors appear in the
tables and /proc/mdstat wants to tell you about all of them.
I could see why that would be the problem why I would get the OOPS from
/proc/mdstat, but the other OOPS I'm getting is just when the box is
syncing the RAID arrays. Could I get an OOPS from md_status_read_proc
overwriting it's buffer if I'm not looking at it? I guess that is a
likely cause.
Let me know what you think.
Thanks,
Andy.
-----Original Message-----
From: Martin J. Bligh [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 2:28 PM
To: Rechenberg, Andrew; [email protected]
Subject: Re: OOPS in do_try_to_free_pages with VERY large software RAID
array
> Can anyone help me out please? I'm trying to create a monster
> software RAID array and the kernel is not behaving. On some test
> hardware I can get 17 RAID1 arrays to begin syncing and will sync with
> /proc/sys/dev/raid/speed_limit_max set to 100000 (the max allowed)
> with no problem.
>
> We wanted to use 26 RAID1 arrays and then stripe across them to get
> very high performance. When I tried to do that this weekend on our
> production box we started getting kernel panics when the RAID1 arrays
> started syncing. This was with speed_limit_max set to 10000 so the
> rate wasn't very high. Since we knew 34 disks worked we decided to
> put the box in to production with just 13 RAID1 arrays and striping
> across those. The performance is great compared to our hardware RAID,
> but I would like to get all the disks we purchase for this system
> working.
>
> This morning I connected 56 disks to our test hardware and tried to
> reproduce the problem. With the test hardware, the 26 RAID1 arrays
> were working OK at speed_limit_max 10000 however the kernel OOPSed
> when I 'less'ed /proc/mdstat. It wasn't a hard crash because I could
> still work. However when I upped the speed_limit_max to 30000 there
> was a hard crash.
At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and
overwriting the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and get
it to printk how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just printk sz
every time it changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the seq_file
interface.
May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what
you're doing, and it's easy to check.
M.
> I could see why that would be the problem why I would get the OOPS from
> /proc/mdstat, but the other OOPS I'm getting is just when the box is
> syncing the RAID arrays. Could I get an OOPS from md_status_read_proc
> overwriting it's buffer if I'm not looking at it? I guess that is a
> likely cause.
/proc will just shoot off the end of the page, overwriting whatever
poor victim is next. So *if* you've done the read of that file (or something
in the boot process has, possibly including the raid userspace tools)
all bets are off on any other oops you get later. Silent data corruption
is *evil* ;-)
The stupid way to try it (ie what I'd do ;-)) is to fix that bug, and
see if you still get the error ;-)
M.
> Let me know what you think.
>
> Thanks,
> Andy.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Martin J. Bligh [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 2:28 PM
> To: Rechenberg, Andrew; [email protected]
> Subject: Re: OOPS in do_try_to_free_pages with VERY large software RAID
> array
>
>
>> Can anyone help me out please? I'm trying to create a monster
>> software RAID array and the kernel is not behaving. On some test
>> hardware I can get 17 RAID1 arrays to begin syncing and will sync with
>
>> /proc/sys/dev/raid/speed_limit_max set to 100000 (the max allowed)
>> with no problem.
>>
>> We wanted to use 26 RAID1 arrays and then stripe across them to get
>> very high performance. When I tried to do that this weekend on our
>> production box we started getting kernel panics when the RAID1 arrays
>> started syncing. This was with speed_limit_max set to 10000 so the
>> rate wasn't very high. Since we knew 34 disks worked we decided to
>> put the box in to production with just 13 RAID1 arrays and striping
>> across those. The performance is great compared to our hardware RAID,
>
>> but I would like to get all the disks we purchase for this system
>> working.
>>
>> This morning I connected 56 disks to our test hardware and tried to
>> reproduce the problem. With the test hardware, the 26 RAID1 arrays
>> were working OK at speed_limit_max 10000 however the kernel OOPSed
>> when I 'less'ed /proc/mdstat. It wasn't a hard crash because I could
>> still work. However when I upped the speed_limit_max to 30000 there
>> was a hard crash.
>
> At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
> md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and
> overwriting the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and get
> it to printk how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just printk sz
> every time it changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the seq_file
> interface.
>
> May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what
> you're doing, and it's easy to check.
>
> M.
>
>
>
>
>
Kevin,
I tried patching md by hand since you're patch is for 2.5 but I'm having
some issues. When I try to make bzImage I'm getting the following
error:
md.c:139: `single_release' undeclared here (not in a function)
md.c:139: initializer element is not constant
md.c:139: (near initialization for `md_state_fops.release')
md.c:140: initializer element is not constant
md.c:140: (near initialization for `md_state_fops')
md.c: In function `md_state_seq_show':
md.c:3219: warning: passing arg 1 of pointer to function from
incompatible pointer type
md.c: In function `md_state_open_fs':
md.c:3238: warning: implicit declaration of function `single_open'
make[3]: *** [md.o] Error 1
make[3]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-flux/drivers/md'
make[2]: *** [first_rule] Error 2
make[2]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-flux/drivers/md'
make[1]: *** [_subdir_md] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-flux/drivers'
make: *** [_dir_drivers] Error 2
Can you tell me if the single_release is a 2.5 "thing?" Can you point
me in the right direction as to how to fix this problem?.
Thanks,
Andy.
-----Original Message-----
From: Kevin P. Fleming [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 2:48 PM
To: Martin J. Bligh
Cc: Rechenberg, Andrew; [email protected]
Subject: Re: OOPS in do_try_to_free_pages with VERY large software RAID
array
Martin J. Bligh wrote:
> At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
> md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and
> overwriting the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and
> get it to printk how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just
> printk sz every time it changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the
> seq_file interface.
>
> May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what
> you're doing, and it's easy to check.
>
> M.
I posted a patch to do exactly this last week to the Linux-RAID mailing
list. If
you check the archives you should find it. This problem also occurs if
you use
the device-mapper under 2.5.X, because it makes all 256 md minors appear
in the
tables and /proc/mdstat wants to tell you about all of them.
On Tue, 11 Mar 2003 12:38:44 -0500 "Rechenberg, Andrew" <[email protected]> wrote:
| Kevin,
|
| I tried patching md by hand since you're patch is for 2.5 but I'm having
| some issues. When I try to make bzImage I'm getting the following
| error:
|
| md.c:139: `single_release' undeclared here (not in a function)
| md.c:139: initializer element is not constant
| md.c:139: (near initialization for `md_state_fops.release')
| md.c:140: initializer element is not constant
| md.c:140: (near initialization for `md_state_fops')
| md.c: In function `md_state_seq_show':
| md.c:3219: warning: passing arg 1 of pointer to function from
| incompatible pointer type
| md.c: In function `md_state_open_fs':
| md.c:3238: warning: implicit declaration of function `single_open'
| make[3]: *** [md.o] Error 1
| make[3]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-flux/drivers/md'
| make[2]: *** [first_rule] Error 2
| make[2]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-flux/drivers/md'
| make[1]: *** [_subdir_md] Error 2
| make[1]: Leaving directory `/usr/src/linux-flux/drivers'
| make: *** [_dir_drivers] Error 2
|
| Can you tell me if the single_release is a 2.5 "thing?" Can you point
| me in the right direction as to how to fix this problem?.
|
| Thanks,
| Andy.
|
| -----Original Message-----
| From: Kevin P. Fleming [mailto:[email protected]]
| Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 2:48 PM
| To: Martin J. Bligh
| Cc: Rechenberg, Andrew; [email protected]
| Subject: Re: OOPS in do_try_to_free_pages with VERY large software RAID
| array
|
|
| Martin J. Bligh wrote:
| > At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
| > md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and
| > overwriting the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and
| > get it to printk how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just
| > printk sz every time it changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the
| > seq_file interface.
| >
| > May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what
| > you're doing, and it's easy to check.
| >
| > M.
|
| I posted a patch to do exactly this last week to the Linux-RAID mailing
| list. If
| you check the archives you should find it. This problem also occurs if
| you use
| the device-mapper under 2.5.X, because it makes all 256 md minors appear
| in the
| tables and /proc/mdstat wants to tell you about all of them.
seq_file interfaces are in 2.4.recent (since around 2.4.15), but
not the single_* methods, only the iterative methods.
--
~Randy
Thanks for the help Martin. It looks like that was the problem. The
kernel mdstat statistics must have been overwriting some other kernel
memory and giving me my panics. With the help of Kevin's 2.5 patch I
patched the Red Hat 2.4.18-26 md code to use seq_file and now my big
RAID arrays are syncing and I haven't had a panic yet :D
Thanks again to everyone for the help. I'll submit the patch to the
linux-raid list as md-seq_file-2.4.18-26.7.x.patch if anyone's
interested.
Regards,
Andy.
-----Original Message-----
From: Martin J. Bligh [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 2:28 PM
To: Rechenberg, Andrew; [email protected]
Subject: Re: OOPS in do_try_to_free_pages with VERY large software RAID
array
> Can anyone help me out please? I'm trying to create a monster
> software RAID array and the kernel is not behaving. On some test
> hardware I can get 17 RAID1 arrays to begin syncing and will sync with
> /proc/sys/dev/raid/speed_limit_max set to 100000 (the max allowed)
> with no problem.
>
> We wanted to use 26 RAID1 arrays and then stripe across them to get
> very high performance. When I tried to do that this weekend on our
> production box we started getting kernel panics when the RAID1 arrays
> started syncing. This was with speed_limit_max set to 10000 so the
> rate wasn't very high. Since we knew 34 disks worked we decided to
> put the box in to production with just 13 RAID1 arrays and striping
> across those. The performance is great compared to our hardware RAID,
> but I would like to get all the disks we purchase for this system
> working.
>
> This morning I connected 56 disks to our test hardware and tried to
> reproduce the problem. With the test hardware, the 26 RAID1 arrays
> were working OK at speed_limit_max 10000 however the kernel OOPSed
> when I 'less'ed /proc/mdstat. It wasn't a hard crash because I could
> still work. However when I upped the speed_limit_max to 30000 there
> was a hard crash.
At a wild guess (OK, I only looked for about 1 minute),
md_status_read_proc is generating more than 4K of information, and
overwriting the end of it's 4K page. Throw some debug in there, and get
it to printk how much of the buffer it thinks it's using (just printk sz
every time it changes it). If it's > 4K, convert it to the seq_file
interface.
May not be it, but it seems likely given the unusual scale of what
you're doing, and it's easy to check.
M.
> Thanks for the help Martin. It looks like that was the problem. The
> kernel mdstat statistics must have been overwriting some other kernel
> memory and giving me my panics. With the help of Kevin's 2.5 patch I
> patched the Red Hat 2.4.18-26 md code to use seq_file and now my big
> RAID arrays are syncing and I haven't had a panic yet :D
>
> Thanks again to everyone for the help. I'll submit the patch to the
> linux-raid list as md-seq_file-2.4.18-26.7.x.patch if anyone's
> interested.
Cool. If I get bored at some point, I might try to make a debug option
to put some minefield trap after /proc functions to catch them doing
this. Or we change the interface ;-)
I got burnt by the same thing for being the first twit to try booting
a 16 CPU ia32 machine ... /proc/cpuinfo went a bit wild.
M.