Re: [PATCH v2 2/4] writeback: name the bdi in the slow writeback report

From: Jan Kara

Date: Tue Nov 10 2026 - 10:14:58 EST


On Tue 10-11-26 03:39:28, Breno Leitao wrote:
> The slow writeback report names the waiting task and how long it has
> waited, but not what it is waiting on. On a machine with several
> filesystems there is no way to tell which device is slow.
>
> Pass the bdi to wb_wait_for_completion() and add its name to the
> report, together with the number of work items still outstanding. A
> sync issues one work item per cgroup wb with dirty inodes, so the count
> also shows whether a single cgroup is holding up the others.
>
> wb_wait_for_completion() took the bdi until commit 5b9cce4c7eb0
> ("writeback: Generalize and expose wb_completion") made it usable for
> the memcg foreign flushes. memcg tracks those by bdi id only and passes
> NULL, which bdi_dev_name() prints as "(unknown)".
>
> A sync of files dirtied from two cgroups, on a throttled null_blk
> device, now reports:
>
> [ 10.043698] INFO: The task sync:276 has been waiting for writeback completion for more than 7 seconds (bdi 252:0, work items left: 2).
>
> Signed-off-by: Breno Leitao <leitao@xxxxxxxxxx>

Looks good. Feel free to add:

Reviewed-by: Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx>

Honza

> ---
> fs/fs-writeback.c | 20 ++++++++++++--------
> include/linux/backing-dev.h | 3 ++-
> mm/memcontrol.c | 2 +-
> 3 files changed, 15 insertions(+), 10 deletions(-)
>
> diff --git a/fs/fs-writeback.c b/fs/fs-writeback.c
> index 01a00d7542b371..c5e9e5c0d506a9 100644
> --- a/fs/fs-writeback.c
> +++ b/fs/fs-writeback.c
> @@ -196,7 +196,8 @@ static void wb_queue_work(struct bdi_writeback *wb,
> spin_unlock_irq(&wb->work_lock);
> }
>
> -static bool wb_wait_for_completion_cb(struct wb_completion *done)
> +static bool wb_wait_for_completion_cb(struct wb_completion *done,
> + struct backing_dev_info *bdi)
> {
> unsigned long timeout = sysctl_hung_task_timeout_secs;
> unsigned long waited_secs = (jiffies - done->wait_start) / HZ;
> @@ -204,8 +205,9 @@ static bool wb_wait_for_completion_cb(struct wb_completion *done)
> done->progress_stamp = jiffies;
> if (timeout && (waited_secs > timeout))
> pr_info("INFO: The task %s:%d has been waiting for writeback "
> - "completion for more than %lu seconds.\n",
> - current->comm, current->pid, waited_secs);
> + "completion for more than %lu seconds (bdi %s, work items left: %d).\n",
> + current->comm, current->pid, waited_secs,
> + bdi_dev_name(bdi), atomic_read(&done->cnt));
>
> return !atomic_read(&done->cnt);
> }
> @@ -213,6 +215,7 @@ static bool wb_wait_for_completion_cb(struct wb_completion *done)
> /**
> * wb_wait_for_completion - wait for completion of bdi_writeback_works
> * @done: target wb_completion
> + * @bdi: bdi work items were issued to, NULL for the memcg foreign flushes
> *
> * Wait for one or more work items issued to @bdi with their ->done field
> * set to @done, which should have been initialized with
> @@ -220,11 +223,12 @@ static bool wb_wait_for_completion_cb(struct wb_completion *done)
> * are completed. Work items which are waited upon aren't freed
> * automatically on completion.
> */
> -void wb_wait_for_completion(struct wb_completion *done)
> +void wb_wait_for_completion(struct wb_completion *done,
> + struct backing_dev_info *bdi)
> {
> done->wait_start = jiffies;
> atomic_dec(&done->cnt); /* put down the initial count */
> - wait_event(*done->waitq, wb_wait_for_completion_cb(done));
> + wait_event(*done->waitq, wb_wait_for_completion_cb(done, bdi));
> }
>
> #ifdef CONFIG_CGROUP_WRITEBACK
> @@ -1164,7 +1168,7 @@ static void bdi_split_work_to_wbs(struct backing_dev_info *bdi,
> last_wb = wb;
>
> rcu_read_unlock();
> - wb_wait_for_completion(&fallback_work_done);
> + wb_wait_for_completion(&fallback_work_done, bdi);
> goto restart;
> }
> rcu_read_unlock();
> @@ -2972,7 +2976,7 @@ static void __writeback_inodes_sb_nr(struct super_block *sb, unsigned long nr,
> WARN_ON(!rwsem_is_locked(&sb->s_umount));
>
> bdi_split_work_to_wbs(sb->s_bdi, &work, skip_if_busy);
> - wb_wait_for_completion(&done);
> + wb_wait_for_completion(&done, bdi);
> }
>
> /**
> @@ -3069,7 +3073,7 @@ void sync_inodes_sb(struct super_block *sb)
> /* protect against inode wb switch, see inode_switch_wbs_work_fn() */
> bdi_down_write_wb_switch_rwsem(bdi);
> bdi_split_work_to_wbs(bdi, &work, false);
> - wb_wait_for_completion(&done);
> + wb_wait_for_completion(&done, bdi);
> bdi_up_write_wb_switch_rwsem(bdi);
>
> wait_sb_inodes(sb);
> diff --git a/include/linux/backing-dev.h b/include/linux/backing-dev.h
> index c2284466e7aa66..808d939d2ca7f9 100644
> --- a/include/linux/backing-dev.h
> +++ b/include/linux/backing-dev.h
> @@ -39,7 +39,8 @@ struct backing_dev_info *bdi_alloc(int node_id);
> void wb_start_background_writeback(struct bdi_writeback *wb);
> void wb_workfn(struct work_struct *work);
>
> -void wb_wait_for_completion(struct wb_completion *done);
> +void wb_wait_for_completion(struct wb_completion *done,
> + struct backing_dev_info *bdi);
>
> extern spinlock_t bdi_lock;
> extern struct list_head bdi_list;
> diff --git a/mm/memcontrol.c b/mm/memcontrol.c
> index ac6c43ea8c5a6d..df462d279a655e 100644
> --- a/mm/memcontrol.c
> +++ b/mm/memcontrol.c
> @@ -4525,7 +4525,7 @@ static void mem_cgroup_css_free(struct cgroup_subsys_state *css)
>
> #ifdef CONFIG_CGROUP_WRITEBACK
> for (i = 0; i < MEMCG_CGWB_FRN_CNT; i++)
> - wb_wait_for_completion(&memcg->cgwb_frn[i].done);
> + wb_wait_for_completion(&memcg->cgwb_frn[i].done, NULL);
> #endif
> if (cgroup_subsys_on_dfl(memory_cgrp_subsys) && !cgroup_memory_nosocket)
> static_branch_dec(&memcg_sockets_enabled_key);
>
> --
> 2.53.0-Meta
>
--
Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxxx>
SUSE Labs, CR