Re: [PATCH] printk: stop spining waiter when console resume to flush prb

[John Ogness]

On 2021-05-10, Petr Mladek <pmladek@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> The current plan is to move console work to kthreads (separate
> preemptive context). Using IRQ is a complete opposite way.
>
> There is always the fight between getting the messages out as soon
> as possible and the risk of breaking the system (softlockups,
> deadlocks).
>
> The kthread approach reduces the risk of system breakage to a bare
> minimum. The price is that some messages might never reach console.
> There is finally a consensus to give it a try. If it fails, we might
> start looking for alternatives again.

+1

I think it is clear that any such fixups will disappear once
atomic-consoles and console printing kthreads arrive. That doesn't mean
we should ignore the fixups. We just need to decide if it is a real
problem that needs our immediate attention, thus warranting a fixup in
the current implementation.

I can see the suspend/resume issue might be a real problem. If this
should be addressed now, I would support Petr's patch, forcing the
backlog to be printed in the preemptible resuming context. But let's
just keep it a suspend/resume fixup. I do not think we want to start
playing with how console_unlock() behaves.

John Ogness