124 lines
4.1 KiB
Plaintext
124 lines
4.1 KiB
Plaintext
File management in the Linux kernel
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-----------------------------------
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This document describes how locking for files (struct file)
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and file descriptor table (struct files) works.
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Up until 2.6.12, the file descriptor table has been protected
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with a lock (files->file_lock) and reference count (files->count).
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->file_lock protected accesses to all the file related fields
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of the table. ->count was used for sharing the file descriptor
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table between tasks cloned with CLONE_FILES flag. Typically
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this would be the case for posix threads. As with the common
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refcounting model in the kernel, the last task doing
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a put_files_struct() frees the file descriptor (fd) table.
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The files (struct file) themselves are protected using
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reference count (->f_count).
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In the new lock-free model of file descriptor management,
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the reference counting is similar, but the locking is
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based on RCU. The file descriptor table contains multiple
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elements - the fd sets (open_fds and close_on_exec, the
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array of file pointers, the sizes of the sets and the array
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etc.). In order for the updates to appear atomic to
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a lock-free reader, all the elements of the file descriptor
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table are in a separate structure - struct fdtable.
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files_struct contains a pointer to struct fdtable through
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which the actual fd table is accessed. Initially the
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fdtable is embedded in files_struct itself. On a subsequent
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expansion of fdtable, a new fdtable structure is allocated
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and files->fdtab points to the new structure. The fdtable
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structure is freed with RCU and lock-free readers either
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see the old fdtable or the new fdtable making the update
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appear atomic. Here are the locking rules for
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the fdtable structure -
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1. All references to the fdtable must be done through
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the files_fdtable() macro :
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struct fdtable *fdt;
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rcu_read_lock();
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fdt = files_fdtable(files);
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....
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if (n <= fdt->max_fds)
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....
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...
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rcu_read_unlock();
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files_fdtable() uses rcu_dereference() macro which takes care of
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the memory barrier requirements for lock-free dereference.
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The fdtable pointer must be read within the read-side
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critical section.
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2. Reading of the fdtable as described above must be protected
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by rcu_read_lock()/rcu_read_unlock().
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3. For any update to the fd table, files->file_lock must
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be held.
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4. To look up the file structure given an fd, a reader
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must use either fcheck() or fcheck_files() APIs. These
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take care of barrier requirements due to lock-free lookup.
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An example :
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struct file *file;
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rcu_read_lock();
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file = fcheck(fd);
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if (file) {
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...
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}
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....
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rcu_read_unlock();
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5. Handling of the file structures is special. Since the look-up
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of the fd (fget()/fget_light()) are lock-free, it is possible
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that look-up may race with the last put() operation on the
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file structure. This is avoided using the rcuref APIs
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on ->f_count :
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rcu_read_lock();
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file = fcheck_files(files, fd);
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if (file) {
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if (rcuref_inc_lf(&file->f_count))
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*fput_needed = 1;
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else
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/* Didn't get the reference, someone's freed */
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file = NULL;
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}
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rcu_read_unlock();
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....
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return file;
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rcuref_inc_lf() detects if refcounts is already zero or
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goes to zero during increment. If it does, we fail
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fget()/fget_light().
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6. Since both fdtable and file structures can be looked up
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lock-free, they must be installed using rcu_assign_pointer()
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API. If they are looked up lock-free, rcu_dereference()
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must be used. However it is advisable to use files_fdtable()
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and fcheck()/fcheck_files() which take care of these issues.
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7. While updating, the fdtable pointer must be looked up while
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holding files->file_lock. If ->file_lock is dropped, then
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another thread expand the files thereby creating a new
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fdtable and making the earlier fdtable pointer stale.
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For example :
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spin_lock(&files->file_lock);
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fd = locate_fd(files, file, start);
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if (fd >= 0) {
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/* locate_fd() may have expanded fdtable, load the ptr */
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fdt = files_fdtable(files);
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FD_SET(fd, fdt->open_fds);
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FD_CLR(fd, fdt->close_on_exec);
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spin_unlock(&files->file_lock);
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.....
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Since locate_fd() can drop ->file_lock (and reacquire ->file_lock),
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the fdtable pointer (fdt) must be loaded after locate_fd().
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