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Date: Fri, 2 Nov 2001 12:03:25 -0700
From: Andreas Dilger <adilger@turbolabs.com>
To: Russ Weight <rweight@us.ibm.com>
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: bdevname(), cdevname(), kdevname() - static buffers
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On Nov 02, 2001  10:42 -0800, Russ Weight wrote:
> I was looking at the usage of bdevname(), cdevname(), and kdevname(),
> and noticed that they each return a pointer to a static buffer.
> This buffer contains a formatted device name, which is typically
> printed immediately following the call. However, I don't see any
> explicit lock protection for these buffers.
> 
> For SMP systems, is there something implicit in their use that
> prevents a race on these buffers? Has anyone seen garbled device
> names being printed (which might be attributed to a race)?

I think the general usage of these is only for informational needs, so
if there is a rare race it is not worth fixing.

Cheers, Andreas
--
Andreas Dilger
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2resize/
http://www-mddsp.enel.ucalgary.ca/People/adilger/

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