Re: Linux 2.4 Status/TODO page (test11-pre3)

From: Jeff Garzik (jgarzik@mandrakesoft.com)
Date: Sun Nov 12 2000 - 22:09:39 EST


tytso@mit.edu wrote:
> 4. Boot Time Failures

> * Various Alpha's don't boot under 2.4.0-test9 (PCI-PCI bridges are
> not configured correctly Michal Jaegermann; Richard Henderson may
> have an idea what's failing.)

Move to patch-exists-but-not-merged. rth has patches, co-developed with
Ivan Kokshaysky

> 8. Fix Exists But Isnt Merged

> * Many network device drivers don't call MOD_INC_USE_COUNT in
> dev->open. (Paul Gortmaker has patches)

Update: net drivers can now set an owner member as of test11-pre3, to
completely eliminate any race. Net drivers that don't call MOD_xxx at
all should just be updated to use the new stuff.

> * using ramfs with highmem enabled can yield a kernel NULL pointer
> dereference. (wollny at cns.mpg.de has a patch)

fixed as of test11-pre2.

> 9. To Do

> * Fix mount failures due to copy_* user mishandling

Details?

> * Misc locking problems
> + Power management locking (Alan Cox)

A patch from Alan for this made it into test10 or test11-pre1.

> * Copying between two encrypting loop devices causes an immediate
> deadlock in the request queue (Andi Kleen)

Loopback block device has serious problems, not just this.. I am gonna
look at it this week...

> * 2.4.0-test10 pcmcia fails to detect IRQ's correctly, and will
> sometimes kill all software interrupts on card insertion on a NEC
> Versa LX (David Ford)

Still does this with test11-pre-latest?

> * VGA Console can cause SMP deadlock when doing printk {CRITICAL}
> (Keith Owens)

move to "should already be fixed, confirmation wanted." I think Keith
said he doesn't exercise that particular code path anymore, so he didn't
test James' patch.

> * drivers/input/mousedev.c dereferences userspace pointers directly
> (prumpf)

yum :)

> 10. To Do But Non Showstopper
>
> * Go through as 2.4pre kicks in and figure what we should mark
> obsolete for the final 2.4 (i.e. XT hard disk support?)

* Go through as 2.4pre kicks in and figure out what FOO_DEBUG options
need to be turned off. __iovirt_debug is a notable one that will hurt
performance (IMHO), because every write[bwl] gets routed to a function
call that checks stuff before performing the I/O.

> * Union mount (Al Viro)

I think this is complete? Isn't this mount --bind?

> * Loop device can still hang (William Stearns has script that will
> hang 2.4.0-test7, Peter Enderborg has a short sequence that will
> hang 2.4.0test9)

Maybe combine this entry and the loopback crypto one above into a more
general "loopback works for some cases, deadlocks for others"

> 11. To Check
> * NFS bugs are fixed

Is this worthy of an entry? I think that every bug fix applied should
have a listing here, then. :) check that parport bugs are fixed.
check that serial bugs are fixed. etc. ...

> * List of potential problems found by Stanford students using g++
> hacks:
> + Andy Chou's list of mismatched spinlocks and interrupts/bh
> enable/disable.
> + Seth Andrew Hallem's list potentially sleeping functions
> called with interrupts off or spinlocks held.
> + Dawson Engler's list of potential kmalloc/kfree bugs

A few people are hanging onto these lists, and going through them. This
could be an 'in progress' item.

> * Potential races in file locking code (Christian Ehrhardt -- patch
> which may fix some of these posted by trond, at
> http://boudicca.tux.org/hypermail/linux-kernel/2000week45/0404.htm
> l)

I think trond's patch was applied.

> * many drivers are not hot-plugging safe (__devinit/__devexit)
> (Barklomiej Zolnierkiewicz)

Many drivers are not supposed to be hotplug safe!

If the hardware is not known to be hotpluggable, then the driver should
not use __devinit/exit. Doing so needlessly avoids the __init code
drop, wasting memory.

> 12. Probably Post 2.4

> * module remove race bugs (ipchains modules -- Rusty; won't fix for
> 2.4)

Is this an ipchains bug, or a more general module subsystem bug?

> * NCR5380 isnt smp safe (Frank Davis --- belives the driver should
> be rewritten)

hehe I personally believe many of the current kernel drivers should be
rewritten ;-)

        Jeff

-- 
Jeff Garzik             |
Building 1024           | Would you like a Twinkie?
MandrakeSoft            |
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