Re: [PATCH 2/4] stop_machine: reimplement using cpuhog

[Heiko Carstens]

On Tue, Mar 09, 2010 at 08:39:40AM +0900, Tejun Heo wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> On 03/09/2010 04:37 AM, Heiko Carstens wrote:
> >> How cpuhog can make a difference? Afaics, we shouldn't pass a
> >> blocking callback to hog_cpus/hog_one_cpu.
> > 
> > Well, it might me true that this shouldn't be done. But I don't see
> > a reason why in general it wouldn't work to pass a function that
> > would block.  So it's just a matter of time until somebody uses it
> > for such a purpose.  For the current stop_machine implementation it
> > would be broken to pass a blocking function (preemption disabled,
> > interrupts disabled).
> 
> Well, all current users don't block and it definitely can be enforced
> by turning off preemption around the callback.  stop_machine() uses
> busy waiting for every state transition so something else blocking on
> a cpu could waste a lot of cpu cycles on other cpus even if the wait
> is guaranteed to be finite.  Would that sooth your concern?

Yes, enforcing non blocking functions would be good.

Thanks!
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