From: KOSAKI Motohiro <kosaki.motohiro@jp.fujitsu.com>
To: KOSAKI Motohiro <kosaki.motohiro@jp.fujitsu.com>,
       LKML <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>, linux-mm <linux-mm@kvack.org>,
       Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>, dm-devel@redhat.com
Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/7] dm: use __GFP_HIGH instead PF_MEMALLOC
Cc: kosaki.motohiro@jp.fujitsu.com
In-Reply-To: <20091117131527.GB6644@agk-dp.fab.redhat.com>
References: <20091117161616.3DD7.A69D9226@jp.fujitsu.com> <20091117131527.GB6644@agk-dp.fab.redhat.com>
Message-Id: <20091118145621.3E1A.A69D9226@jp.fujitsu.com>
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Date: Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:17:54 +0900 (JST)
Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org
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Hi,

Thank you for give me comment.

> On Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 04:17:07PM +0900, KOSAKI Motohiro wrote:
> > Non MM subsystem must not use PF_MEMALLOC. Memory reclaim need few
> > memory, anyone must not prevent it. Otherwise the system cause
> > mysterious hang-up and/or OOM Killer invokation.
>  
> This code is also on the critical path, for example, if you are swapping
> onto a dm device.  (There are ways we could reduce its use further as
> not every dm ioctl needs to be on the critical path and the buffer size
> could be limited for the ioctls that do.)

May I ask one additional question?
Original code is here.

	-------------------------------------------------------
        /*
         * Trying to avoid low memory issues when a device is
         * suspended.
         */
        current->flags |= PF_MEMALLOC;

        /*
         * Copy the parameters into kernel space.
         */
        r = copy_params(user, &param);

        current->flags &= ~PF_MEMALLOC;
	-------------------------------------------------------

but PF_MEMALLOC doesn't gurantee allocation successfull. In your case,
mempoll seems better to me. copy_params seems enough small function 
and we can rewrite it. Why didn't you use mempool?

Am I missing something?


> But what situations have been causing you trouble?  The OOM killer must
> generally avoid killing userspace processes that suspend & resume dm
> devices, and there are tight restrictions on what those processes
> can do safely between suspending and resuming.

No. This is theorical issue. but I really want to avoid stress weakness
kernel.


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