Re: [PATCH] slub: track number of slabs irrespective of CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG

[Michal Hocko]

On Thu 21-06-18 01:15:30, Cristopher Lameter wrote:
> On Wed, 20 Jun 2018, Shakeel Butt wrote:
> 
> > For !CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG, SLUB does not maintain the number of slabs
> > allocated per node for a kmem_cache. Thus, slabs_node() in
> > __kmem_cache_empty(), __kmem_cache_shrink() and __kmem_cache_destroy()
> > will always return 0 for such config. This is wrong and can cause issues
> > for all users of these functions.
> 
> 
> CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG is set by default on almost all builds. The only case
> where CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG is switched off is when we absolutely need to use
> the minimum amount of memory (embedded or some such thing).

I thought those would be using SLOB rather than SLUB.

> 
> > The right solution is to make slabs_node() work even for
> > !CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG. The commit 0f389ec63077 ("slub: No need for per node
> > slab counters if !SLUB_DEBUG") had put the per node slab counter under
> > CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG because it was only read through sysfs API and the
> > sysfs API was disabled on !CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG. However the users of the
> > per node slab counter assumed that it will work in the absence of
> > CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG. So, make the counter work for !CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG.
> 
> Please do not do this. Find a way to avoid these checks. The
> objective of a !CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG configuration is to not compile in
> debuggin checks etc etc in order to reduce the code/data footprint to the
> minimum necessary while sacrificing debuggability etc etc.
> 
> Maybe make it impossible to disable CONFIG_SLUB_DEBUG if CGROUPs are in
> use?

Why don't we simply remove the config option altogether and make it
enabled effectively.
-- 
Michal Hocko
SUSE Labs