2011-02-24 06:30:03

by Josh Hunt

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

[resending: left Jan off the original mail by accident]

We have a multi-threaded workload which is currently "losing" files in the form
of unattached inodes. The workload is link, rename, unlink intensive. This is
happening on an ext2 filesystem and have reproduced the issue in kernel
2.6.37. Here's a sample strace:

open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 9
link("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", "/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059") = 0
rename("/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059", "/a/tmp/tmpfile") = 0
stat64("/a/tmp/tmpfile", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=24248267, ...}) = 0
link("/a/tmp/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile") = 0
open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_RDONLY) = 13
open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_EXCL, 0600) = 824
rename("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
unlink("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058") = 0
open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 827
open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 828
open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 829
unlink("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0

The application behavior shown above repeats indefinitely with most filenames
changing during each iteration except for 'tmpfile'. Looking into this issue I
see that vfs_rename_other() only takes i_mutex for the new inode and the new
inode's directory as well as the old directory's mutex. This works for
modifying the dir entry and appears to be fine for most filesystems, but
ext2 and a few others (exofs, minix, nilfs2, omfs, sysv, ufs) modify i_nlink
inside of their respective rename functions without grabbing the i_mutex. The
modifications are done through calls to inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and
inode_dec_link_count(old_inode), etc.

Taking the mutex for the old inode appears to resolve the issue of the
lost files/unattached inodes that I am seeing with this workload. I've attached
a patch below doing what I've described above. If this is an accepted solution
I believe other filesystems may also be affected by this and I could provide
a patch for those as well.

Thanks
Josh

ext2_rename modifies old_inode's nlink values through
inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and inode_dec_link_count(old_inode) without
holding old_inode's mutex. vfs_rename_other() only takes the mutex of the new
inode and directory and old inode's directory. This causes old inode's nlink
values to become incorrect and results in an unattached inode.

CC: Eric Sandeen <[email protected]>
Signed-off-by: Josh Hunt <[email protected]>
---
fs/ext2/namei.c | 4 ++++
1 files changed, 4 insertions(+), 0 deletions(-)

diff --git a/fs/ext2/namei.c b/fs/ext2/namei.c
index 2e1d834..827839a 100644
--- a/fs/ext2/namei.c
+++ b/fs/ext2/namei.c
@@ -321,6 +321,8 @@ static int ext2_rename (struct inode * old_dir, struct dentry * old_dentry,
dquot_initialize(old_dir);
dquot_initialize(new_dir);

+ mutex_lock(&old_inode->i_mutex);
+
old_de = ext2_find_entry (old_dir, &old_dentry->d_name, &old_page);
if (!old_de)
goto out;
@@ -375,6 +377,7 @@ static int ext2_rename (struct inode * old_dir, struct dentry * old_dentry,

ext2_delete_entry (old_de, old_page);
inode_dec_link_count(old_inode);
+ mutex_unlock(&old_inode->i_mutex);

if (dir_de) {
if (old_dir != new_dir)
@@ -397,6 +400,7 @@ out_old:
kunmap(old_page);
page_cache_release(old_page);
out:
+ mutex_unlock(&old_inode->i_mutex);
return err;
}

--
1.7.0.4



2011-02-24 06:37:52

by Al Viro

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 10:21:41PM -0800, Josh Hunt wrote:
> [resending: left Jan off the original mail by accident]
>
> We have a multi-threaded workload which is currently "losing" files in the form
> of unattached inodes. The workload is link, rename, unlink intensive. This is
> happening on an ext2 filesystem and have reproduced the issue in kernel
> 2.6.37. Here's a sample strace:
>
> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 9
> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", "/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059") = 0
> rename("/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059", "/a/tmp/tmpfile") = 0
> stat64("/a/tmp/tmpfile", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=24248267, ...}) = 0
> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile") = 0
> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_RDONLY) = 13
> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_EXCL, 0600) = 824
> rename("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
> unlink("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058") = 0
> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 827
> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 828
> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 829
> unlink("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
>
> The application behavior shown above repeats indefinitely with most filenames
> changing during each iteration except for 'tmpfile'. Looking into this issue I
> see that vfs_rename_other() only takes i_mutex for the new inode and the new
> inode's directory as well as the old directory's mutex. This works for
> modifying the dir entry and appears to be fine for most filesystems, but
> ext2 and a few others (exofs, minix, nilfs2, omfs, sysv, ufs) modify i_nlink
> inside of their respective rename functions without grabbing the i_mutex. The
> modifications are done through calls to inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and
> inode_dec_link_count(old_inode), etc.
>
> Taking the mutex for the old inode appears to resolve the issue of the
> lost files/unattached inodes that I am seeing with this workload. I've attached
> a patch below doing what I've described above. If this is an accepted solution
> I believe other filesystems may also be affected by this and I could provide
> a patch for those as well.

I don't know... The thing is, we mostly do that to make life easier for
fsck in case of crash. Other than that, there's no reason to play with
link count of that sucker at all. The question is, do we really want
such rename() interrupted by dirty shutdown to result in what looks like two
legitimate links to that inode without any indications of what had happened?
Note that fsck (at least on ext2) will correct link counts anyway and if
nothing else, we probably want some noise pointing to the inode in question...

IOW, maybe it's better to rip these inc/dec for old_inode out and replace
them with mark_inode_dirty() in place where we currently do dec. Comments?

2011-02-24 11:20:14

by Jan Kara

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On Thu 24-02-11 06:37:49, Al Viro wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 10:21:41PM -0800, Josh Hunt wrote:
> > [resending: left Jan off the original mail by accident]
> >
> > We have a multi-threaded workload which is currently "losing" files in the form
> > of unattached inodes. The workload is link, rename, unlink intensive. This is
> > happening on an ext2 filesystem and have reproduced the issue in kernel
> > 2.6.37. Here's a sample strace:
> >
> > open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 9
> > link("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", "/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059") = 0
> > rename("/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059", "/a/tmp/tmpfile") = 0
> > stat64("/a/tmp/tmpfile", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=24248267, ...}) = 0
> > link("/a/tmp/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile") = 0
> > open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_RDONLY) = 13
> > open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_EXCL, 0600) = 824
> > rename("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
> > unlink("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058") = 0
> > open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 827
> > open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 828
> > open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 829
> > unlink("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
> >
> > The application behavior shown above repeats indefinitely with most filenames
> > changing during each iteration except for 'tmpfile'. Looking into this issue I
> > see that vfs_rename_other() only takes i_mutex for the new inode and the new
> > inode's directory as well as the old directory's mutex. This works for
> > modifying the dir entry and appears to be fine for most filesystems, but
> > ext2 and a few others (exofs, minix, nilfs2, omfs, sysv, ufs) modify i_nlink
> > inside of their respective rename functions without grabbing the i_mutex. The
> > modifications are done through calls to inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and
> > inode_dec_link_count(old_inode), etc.
> >
> > Taking the mutex for the old inode appears to resolve the issue of the
> > lost files/unattached inodes that I am seeing with this workload. I've attached
> > a patch below doing what I've described above. If this is an accepted solution
> > I believe other filesystems may also be affected by this and I could provide
> > a patch for those as well.
>
> I don't know... The thing is, we mostly do that to make life easier for
> fsck in case of crash. Other than that, there's no reason to play with
> link count of that sucker at all. The question is, do we really want
> such rename() interrupted by dirty shutdown to result in what looks like two
> legitimate links to that inode without any indications of what had happened?
> Note that fsck (at least on ext2) will correct link counts anyway and if
> nothing else, we probably want some noise pointing to the inode in question...
Yeah, I agree that playing with the link count is not worth it. It is
even more disputable because it would have some reasonable effect only if
we happened to write out the moved inode after it is linked to the new
directory and before it is unlinked from the old one. Moreover we'd need
to writeout the new directory and not the old directory before crash
happens. All this is highly unlikely and even if that happens, it is
questionable whether the result is worth it. So I'll just do away with
those games with link count...
The patch is attached. Josh, can you test it as well? Thanks.

Honza
--
Jan Kara <[email protected]>
SUSE Labs, CR


Attachments:
(No filename) (3.54 kB)
0001-ext2-Fix-link-count-corruption-under-heavy-link-rena.patch (2.13 kB)
Download all attachments

2011-02-24 20:18:32

by Josh Hunt

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On 02/24/2011 03:20 AM, Jan Kara wrote:
> On Thu 24-02-11 06:37:49, Al Viro wrote:
>> On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 10:21:41PM -0800, Josh Hunt wrote:
>>> [resending: left Jan off the original mail by accident]
>>>
>>> We have a multi-threaded workload which is currently "losing" files in the form
>>> of unattached inodes. The workload is link, rename, unlink intensive. This is
>>> happening on an ext2 filesystem and have reproduced the issue in kernel
>>> 2.6.37. Here's a sample strace:
>>>
>>> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 9
>>> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", "/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059") = 0
>>> rename("/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059", "/a/tmp/tmpfile") = 0
>>> stat64("/a/tmp/tmpfile", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=24248267, ...}) = 0
>>> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile") = 0
>>> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_RDONLY) = 13
>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_EXCL, 0600) = 824
>>> rename("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
>>> unlink("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058") = 0
>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 827
>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 828
>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 829
>>> unlink("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
>>>
>>> The application behavior shown above repeats indefinitely with most filenames
>>> changing during each iteration except for 'tmpfile'. Looking into this issue I
>>> see that vfs_rename_other() only takes i_mutex for the new inode and the new
>>> inode's directory as well as the old directory's mutex. This works for
>>> modifying the dir entry and appears to be fine for most filesystems, but
>>> ext2 and a few others (exofs, minix, nilfs2, omfs, sysv, ufs) modify i_nlink
>>> inside of their respective rename functions without grabbing the i_mutex. The
>>> modifications are done through calls to inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and
>>> inode_dec_link_count(old_inode), etc.
>>>
>>> Taking the mutex for the old inode appears to resolve the issue of the
>>> lost files/unattached inodes that I am seeing with this workload. I've attached
>>> a patch below doing what I've described above. If this is an accepted solution
>>> I believe other filesystems may also be affected by this and I could provide
>>> a patch for those as well.
>>
>> I don't know... The thing is, we mostly do that to make life easier for
>> fsck in case of crash. Other than that, there's no reason to play with
>> link count of that sucker at all. The question is, do we really want
>> such rename() interrupted by dirty shutdown to result in what looks like two
>> legitimate links to that inode without any indications of what had happened?
>> Note that fsck (at least on ext2) will correct link counts anyway and if
>> nothing else, we probably want some noise pointing to the inode in question...
> Yeah, I agree that playing with the link count is not worth it. It is
> even more disputable because it would have some reasonable effect only if
> we happened to write out the moved inode after it is linked to the new
> directory and before it is unlinked from the old one. Moreover we'd need
> to writeout the new directory and not the old directory before crash
> happens. All this is highly unlikely and even if that happens, it is
> questionable whether the result is worth it. So I'll just do away with
> those games with link count...
> The patch is attached. Josh, can you test it as well? Thanks.
>
> Honza
Jan

I'm not seeing the problem with your patch as was expected since we're
not messing with i_nlink anymore. Al suggested marking the inode as
dirty where we were previously doing the old_inode dec. I believe this
is needed as well since we are updating it's ctime. I've attached a
version marking the inode dirty and it also fixes the comment making
reference to calling inode_dec_link_count().

I'm not completely clear on the historical reasons for messing with the
link count of old_inode in the first place. It was just to simulate the
linking and unlinking of the old_inode?

Thanks
Josh


Attachments:
0001-ext2-Resolve-i_nlink-count-corruption-with-heavy-unl.patch (1.99 kB)

2011-02-25 07:38:16

by Marco Stornelli

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

Hi,

2011/2/24 Josh Hunt <[email protected]>:
> Jan
>
> I'm not seeing the problem with your patch as was expected since we're
> not messing with i_nlink anymore. Al suggested marking the inode as
> dirty where we were previously doing the old_inode dec. I believe this
> is needed as well since we are updating it's ctime. I've attached a
> version marking the inode dirty and it also fixes the comment making
> reference to calling inode_dec_link_count().
>
> I'm not completely clear on the historical reasons for messing with the
> link count of old_inode in the first place. It was just to simulate the
> linking and unlinking of the old_inode?
>
> Thanks
> Josh
>

can we share your test/benchmark? I'd like to add it to my test suite
as no-regression test.

Marco

2011-02-28 17:57:34

by Jan Kara

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On Thu 24-02-11 12:18:32, Josh Hunt wrote:
> On 02/24/2011 03:20 AM, Jan Kara wrote:
> > On Thu 24-02-11 06:37:49, Al Viro wrote:
> >> On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 10:21:41PM -0800, Josh Hunt wrote:
> >>> [resending: left Jan off the original mail by accident]
> >>>
> >>> We have a multi-threaded workload which is currently "losing" files in the form
> >>> of unattached inodes. The workload is link, rename, unlink intensive. This is
> >>> happening on an ext2 filesystem and have reproduced the issue in kernel
> >>> 2.6.37. Here's a sample strace:
> >>>
> >>> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 9
> >>> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", "/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059") = 0
> >>> rename("/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059", "/a/tmp/tmpfile") = 0
> >>> stat64("/a/tmp/tmpfile", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=24248267, ...}) = 0
> >>> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile") = 0
> >>> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_RDONLY) = 13
> >>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_EXCL, 0600) = 824
> >>> rename("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
> >>> unlink("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058") = 0
> >>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 827
> >>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 828
> >>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 829
> >>> unlink("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
> >>>
> >>> The application behavior shown above repeats indefinitely with most filenames
> >>> changing during each iteration except for 'tmpfile'. Looking into this issue I
> >>> see that vfs_rename_other() only takes i_mutex for the new inode and the new
> >>> inode's directory as well as the old directory's mutex. This works for
> >>> modifying the dir entry and appears to be fine for most filesystems, but
> >>> ext2 and a few others (exofs, minix, nilfs2, omfs, sysv, ufs) modify i_nlink
> >>> inside of their respective rename functions without grabbing the i_mutex. The
> >>> modifications are done through calls to inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and
> >>> inode_dec_link_count(old_inode), etc.
> >>>
> >>> Taking the mutex for the old inode appears to resolve the issue of the
> >>> lost files/unattached inodes that I am seeing with this workload. I've attached
> >>> a patch below doing what I've described above. If this is an accepted solution
> >>> I believe other filesystems may also be affected by this and I could provide
> >>> a patch for those as well.
> >>
> >> I don't know... The thing is, we mostly do that to make life easier for
> >> fsck in case of crash. Other than that, there's no reason to play with
> >> link count of that sucker at all. The question is, do we really want
> >> such rename() interrupted by dirty shutdown to result in what looks like two
> >> legitimate links to that inode without any indications of what had happened?
> >> Note that fsck (at least on ext2) will correct link counts anyway and if
> >> nothing else, we probably want some noise pointing to the inode in question...
> > Yeah, I agree that playing with the link count is not worth it. It is
> > even more disputable because it would have some reasonable effect only if
> > we happened to write out the moved inode after it is linked to the new
> > directory and before it is unlinked from the old one. Moreover we'd need
> > to writeout the new directory and not the old directory before crash
> > happens. All this is highly unlikely and even if that happens, it is
> > questionable whether the result is worth it. So I'll just do away with
> > those games with link count...
> > The patch is attached. Josh, can you test it as well? Thanks.
> >
> > Honza
> Jan
>
> I'm not seeing the problem with your patch as was expected since we're
> not messing with i_nlink anymore. Al suggested marking the inode as
> dirty where we were previously doing the old_inode dec. I believe this
> is needed as well since we are updating it's ctime. I've attached a
> version marking the inode dirty and it also fixes the comment making
> reference to calling inode_dec_link_count().
Yeah, good catch. Thanks.

> I'm not completely clear on the historical reasons for messing with the
> link count of old_inode in the first place. It was just to simulate the
> linking and unlinking of the old_inode?
Yes.

So I took your patch and used a changelog from mine as I find it more
descriptive. The resulting patch is in my tree (and attached).

Honza
--
Jan Kara <[email protected]>
SUSE Labs, CR


Attachments:
(No filename) (4.53 kB)
0001-ext2-Fix-link-count-corruption-under-heavy-link-rena.patch (2.31 kB)
Download all attachments

2011-02-28 20:17:55

by Josh Hunt

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On 02/28/2011 09:57 AM, Jan Kara wrote:
> On Thu 24-02-11 12:18:32, Josh Hunt wrote:
>> On 02/24/2011 03:20 AM, Jan Kara wrote:
>>> On Thu 24-02-11 06:37:49, Al Viro wrote:
>>>> On Wed, Feb 23, 2011 at 10:21:41PM -0800, Josh Hunt wrote:
>>>>> [resending: left Jan off the original mail by accident]
>>>>>
>>>>> We have a multi-threaded workload which is currently "losing" files in the form
>>>>> of unattached inodes. The workload is link, rename, unlink intensive. This is
>>>>> happening on an ext2 filesystem and have reproduced the issue in kernel
>>>>> 2.6.37. Here's a sample strace:
>>>>>
>>>>> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 9
>>>>> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", "/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059") = 0
>>>>> rename("/a/tmp/tmpfile.28117.1296184059", "/a/tmp/tmpfile") = 0
>>>>> stat64("/a/tmp/tmpfile", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=24248267, ...}) = 0
>>>>> link("/a/tmp/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile") = 0
>>>>> open("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058", O_RDONLY) = 13
>>>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_EXCL, 0600) = 824
>>>>> rename("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile", "/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
>>>>> unlink("/a/tmp/tmpfile.1296184058") = 0
>>>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 827
>>>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 828
>>>>> open("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL", O_RDONLY) = 829
>>>>> unlink("/a/tmp/submit/tmpfile.send.q9SNoL") = 0
>>>>>
>>>>> The application behavior shown above repeats indefinitely with most filenames
>>>>> changing during each iteration except for 'tmpfile'. Looking into this issue I
>>>>> see that vfs_rename_other() only takes i_mutex for the new inode and the new
>>>>> inode's directory as well as the old directory's mutex. This works for
>>>>> modifying the dir entry and appears to be fine for most filesystems, but
>>>>> ext2 and a few others (exofs, minix, nilfs2, omfs, sysv, ufs) modify i_nlink
>>>>> inside of their respective rename functions without grabbing the i_mutex. The
>>>>> modifications are done through calls to inode_inc_link_count(old_inode) and
>>>>> inode_dec_link_count(old_inode), etc.
>>>>>
>>>>> Taking the mutex for the old inode appears to resolve the issue of the
>>>>> lost files/unattached inodes that I am seeing with this workload. I've attached
>>>>> a patch below doing what I've described above. If this is an accepted solution
>>>>> I believe other filesystems may also be affected by this and I could provide
>>>>> a patch for those as well.
>>>>
>>>> I don't know... The thing is, we mostly do that to make life easier for
>>>> fsck in case of crash. Other than that, there's no reason to play with
>>>> link count of that sucker at all. The question is, do we really want
>>>> such rename() interrupted by dirty shutdown to result in what looks like two
>>>> legitimate links to that inode without any indications of what had happened?
>>>> Note that fsck (at least on ext2) will correct link counts anyway and if
>>>> nothing else, we probably want some noise pointing to the inode in question...
>>> Yeah, I agree that playing with the link count is not worth it. It is
>>> even more disputable because it would have some reasonable effect only if
>>> we happened to write out the moved inode after it is linked to the new
>>> directory and before it is unlinked from the old one. Moreover we'd need
>>> to writeout the new directory and not the old directory before crash
>>> happens. All this is highly unlikely and even if that happens, it is
>>> questionable whether the result is worth it. So I'll just do away with
>>> those games with link count...
>>> The patch is attached. Josh, can you test it as well? Thanks.
>>>
>>> Honza
>> Jan
>>
>> I'm not seeing the problem with your patch as was expected since we're
>> not messing with i_nlink anymore. Al suggested marking the inode as
>> dirty where we were previously doing the old_inode dec. I believe this
>> is needed as well since we are updating it's ctime. I've attached a
>> version marking the inode dirty and it also fixes the comment making
>> reference to calling inode_dec_link_count().
> Yeah, good catch. Thanks.
>
>> I'm not completely clear on the historical reasons for messing with the
>> link count of old_inode in the first place. It was just to simulate the
>> linking and unlinking of the old_inode?
> Yes.
>
> So I took your patch and used a changelog from mine as I find it more
> descriptive. The resulting patch is in my tree (and attached).
>
> Honza
Jan

Thanks. We should probably send this to the stable guys as well.

I've found the same issue with a few other filesystems. I'll bundle up
those patches and send out a set in the coming days along with an easily
reproducible testcase.

Josh

2011-02-28 20:56:54

by Jan Kara

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On Mon 28-02-11 12:17:55, Josh Hunt wrote:
> On 02/28/2011 09:57 AM, Jan Kara wrote:
> > So I took your patch and used a changelog from mine as I find it more
> > descriptive. The resulting patch is in my tree (and attached).
> >
> > Honza
> Jan
>
> Thanks. We should probably send this to the stable guys as well.
Good point. Made sure they are warned when the patch gets in.

Honza

--
Jan Kara <[email protected]>
SUSE Labs, CR

2011-03-01 11:07:05

by Christoph Hellwig

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

Can you wire up your testcase with xfstests so we can regression test
for it in the future?


2011-03-01 12:15:30

by Al Viro

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: [RFC][PATCH] ext2: Resolve i_nlink race in ext2_rename

On Mon, Feb 28, 2011 at 09:56:52PM +0100, Jan Kara wrote:
> On Mon 28-02-11 12:17:55, Josh Hunt wrote:
> > On 02/28/2011 09:57 AM, Jan Kara wrote:
> > > So I took your patch and used a changelog from mine as I find it more
> > > descriptive. The resulting patch is in my tree (and attached).
> > >
> > > Honza
> > Jan
> >
> > Thanks. We should probably send this to the stable guys as well.
> Good point. Made sure they are warned when the patch gets in.

I have an equivalent of that for other affected fs in my tree; will go
to Linus in an hour or so.