Re: [PATCH 1/3] Implement generic freeze feature

Takashi Sato
2008-06-27T11:32:49Z

Hi,

>> +/*
>> + * get_super_without_lock - Get super_block from block_device without lock.
>> + * @bdev: block device struct
>> + *
>> + * Scan the superblock list and finds the superblock of the file system
>> + * mounted on the block device given. This doesn't lock anyone.
>> + * %NULL is returned if no match is found.
>> + */
>
> This is not a terribly good comment.
>
> Which lock are we not taking? I _assume_ that it's referring to
> s_umount? If so, the text should describe that.
>
> It should also go to some lengths explaining why this dangerous-looking
> and rather nasty-looking function exists.
>
> Look at it this way: there is no way in which the reviewer of this
> patch (ie: me) can work out why this function exists. Hence there will
> be no way in which future readers of this code will be able to work out
> why this function exists either. This is bad. These things should be
> described in code comments and in the changelog (whichever is most
> appropriate).

Thank you for your comment. I will write comments appropriately.

I was wrong. I thought we didn't need to lock s_umount because
this ioctl required to open a regular file or a directory and we cannot
unmount a target filesystem.
So I created get_super_without_lock() used in freeze_bdev().

But, I have found that the ioctl (DM_DEV_SUSPEND_CMD in
drivers/md/dm-ioctl.c) requires to open a logical volume
(not a file or a directory) and calls freeze_bdev(), so we can unmount
a filesystem.
So I will replace get_super_without_lock with get_super to get s_umount.

Cheers, Takashi