Patch to eliminate struct files_struct.file_lock spinlock on the reader side
and use rcu refcounting rcuref_xxx api for the f_count refcounter. The
updates to the fdtable are done by allocating a new fdtable structure and
setting files->fdt to point to the new structure. The fdtable structure is
protected by RCU thereby allowing lock-free lookup. For fd arrays/sets that
are vmalloced, we use keventd to free them since RCU callbacks can't sleep. A
global list of fdtable to be freed is not scalable, so we use a per-cpu list.
If keventd is already handling the current cpu's work, we use a timer to defer
queueing of that work.
Since the last publication, this patch has been re-written to avoid using
explicit memory barriers and use rcu_assign_pointer(), rcu_dereference()
premitives instead. This required that the fd information is kept in a
separate structure (fdtable) and updated atomically.
Signed-off-by: Dipankar Sarma <dipankar@in.ibm.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
In order for the RCU to work, the file table array, sets and their sizes must
be updated atomically. Instead of ensuring this through too many memory
barriers, we put the arrays and their sizes in a separate structure. This
patch takes the first step of putting the file table elements in a separate
structure fdtable that is embedded withing files_struct. It also changes all
the users to refer to the file table using files_fdtable() macro. Subsequent
applciation of RCU becomes easier after this.
Signed-off-by: Dipankar Sarma <dipankar@in.ibm.com>
Signed-Off-By: David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>
Initial git repository build. I'm not bothering with the full history,
even though we have it. We can create a separate "historical" git
archive of that later if we want to, and in the meantime it's about
3.2GB when imported into git - space that would just make the early
git days unnecessarily complicated, when we don't have a lot of good
infrastructure for it.
Let it rip!
Dipankar Sarma