Re: [Announce] BKL shifting into drivers and filesystems - beware

From: Martin Frey (frey@scs.ch)
Date: Thu Jul 13 2000 - 03:30:40 EST


Hi,

can you tell me something about when the changes on VFS layer
will be done?
I know, it's software..., but just a hint would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Martin Frey

Alexander Viro wrote:
>
>
> What is going to happen:
>
> * ->release() will be called without BKL. You need it - you take it.
> I've added lock_kernel()/unlock_kernel() in all dubious instances of
> ->release(). In many cases removal will be trivial (switching a variable
> or two from int to atomic_t, etc.), so when it will go into the tree -
> check your drivers. Folks with 3rd-party code will have to add BKL
> grabbing themselves - sorry, I'm not clairvoyant. Patch submitted to
> Linus.
>
> * Probably inode methods for directories are going to be called without
> BKL. Again, I'll do the work for in-kernel filesystems, but 3rd-party ones
> will have to be fixed by their maintainers.
>
> * Probably ->fasync() is going to be called without BKL - in most cases
> BKL is not be needed at all.
>
> BTW, while you are at it - check your ->read() and ->write(). In many
> drivers they do not look SMP-safe, AFAICS.
>

-- 
Supercomputing Systems AG        email: frey@scs.ch	
Martin Frey                      www:   http://www.scs.ch/~frey
Technoparkstrasse 1		 phone: +41 (0)1 445 16 00
CH-8005 Zurich			 fax:	+41 (0)1 445 16 10

- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.rutgers.edu Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sat Jul 15 2000 - 21:00:16 EST