Re: [PATCH net] netpoll: run NAPI poll in softirq context to avoid rq->lock self-deadlock

[Breno Leitao]

On Tue, Jun 16, 2026 at 12:35:29PM +0200, Sebastian Andrzej Siewior wrote:
> On 2026-06-11 19:11:14 [-0700], Jakub Kicinski wrote:
> > On Wed, 10 Jun 2026 11:36:21 -0700 Vlad Poenaru wrote:
> > > @@ -194,11 +194,56 @@ void netpoll_poll_dev(struct net_device *dev)
> > > +	local_bh_disable();
> > > + 	poll_napi(dev);
> > > +	_local_bh_enable();
> >
> > tglx, Sebastian, are you okay with using _local_bh_enable() to trick
> > softirq into not waking ksoftirqd? The problematic path is:
> >
> >   scheduler -> printk -> netconsole -> raise softirq -> scheduler (deadlock)
> >
> > so the softirq may never get serviced.
> >
> > In netcons we try to avoid touching the network driver if the Tx path
> > locks are already held. Ideally we'd do something similar with the
> > scheduler. Try to do bare minimum if we may be in the scheduler.
> > Failing that - don't poll the driver if we were called with irqs
> > already disabled.
> >
> > Or maybe we only poll from console->write_thread ?
>
> So this is not an issue since commit 7eab73b18630e ("netconsole: convert
> to NBCON console infrastructure"). Because from here now on writes are
> deferred to the nbcon thread. So this purely about -stable in this case.

Does the nbcon thread handle defer even for consoles that support atomic
operations?

netconsole is marked with CON_NBCON_ATOMIC_UNSAFE, which means it rarely
performs inline/direct printk and instead pushes to the thread, which
flushes in a safe context.

For drivers that behave correctly, I'd like to be able to drop
CON_NBCON_ATOMIC_UNSAFE, potentially setting it at runtime based on the
underlying driver capabilities. If netconsole is backed by a well-behaving
network driver, we could eventually remove the flag (!?)

Would that approach cause any issues?