Re: [patch 1/2] xfs: xfs_tosspages() bug

[Dave Chinner <david@fromorbit.com>]

On Thu, Nov 08, 2012 at 05:46:42PM -0600, Ben Myers wrote:
> Hey Dave,
> 
> On Fri, Nov 09, 2012 at 10:06:49AM +1100, Dave Chinner wrote:
> > On Thu, Nov 08, 2012 at 04:23:16PM -0600, Andrew Dahl wrote:
> > > xfs_tosspages() takes a closed interval as an argument, take 
> > > this into account when rounding down to the last byte of the
> > > last complete page. If the request consists of a single 
> > > partial page, there will be nothing to toss. 
> > > 
> > > Signed-off-by: Andrew Dahl <adahl@sgi.com>
> > > 
> > > ---
> 
> ...
> 
> > So the change is good.
> > 
> > However, there's a bigger issue here. We've planned to remove these
> > wrappers for a long time, just never got around to doing it. Seeing
> > as there is a bug in this wrapper and it needs to be fixed, now
> > seems like the right time to remove it.
> 
> The removal of the wrappers would not be appropriate for -stable.  This fix
> needs to go in separately from any refactoring so that it can be pulled back
> within the rules outlined in Documentation/stable_kernel_rules.txt.

You're acting like I've never read those rules before. I know
exactly what they say, and patch that removes a busted helper is
well and truly within the scope of a stable backport. Quoting rules
at me like I'm a newbie only serves to annoy me....

As it is, looking at what xfs_tosspages is supposed to be doing,
calling truncate_inode_pages_range() is actually the wrong thing to
do.  We should be calling truncate_pagecache_range(), because we
should be unmapping pages before truncating them away. And for that
same reason, xfs_flushinvalidate() is also wrong and broken.

That is, the call in xfs_swap_extents() changes to:

-	xfs_tosspages(ip, 0, -1, FI_REMAPF);
+	truncate_pagecache_range(VFS_I(ip), 0, -1);

And the one in xfs_change_file_space becomes:

-		xfs_tosspages(ip, startoffset, startoffset + bf->l_len, 0);
+		truncate_pagecache_range(VFS_I(ip), startoffset,
+					 startoffset + bf->l_len);

and xfs_tosspages() goes away. That's a far better fix for the
problem than what has been proposed, IMO, and in no way is
inappropriate for -stable.

As it is, I wouldn't even consider this a fix that is needed for
stable kernels - XFS_IOC_ZERO is an obscure interface, and
xfs_swap_extents works just fine as it stands....

....
> > >  		prealloc_type |= XFS_BMAPI_CONVERT;
> > > -		xfs_tosspages(ip, startoffset, startoffset + bf->l_len, 0);
> > > +		xfs_tosspages(ip, startoffset, bf->l_len ? startoffset + llen : -1, 0);
> > >  		/* FALLTHRU */
> > >  	case XFS_IOC_RESVSP:
> > >  	case XFS_IOC_RESVSP64:
> > 
> > What's this hunk for? Indeed, one of the first things that the
> > xfs_alloc_file_space() checks is this:
> > 
> >         if (len <= 0)
> > 		return XFS_ERROR(EINVAL);
> > 
> > xfs_free_file_space() does the same check, so it is invalid to pass
> > a bf_len <= 0 for any of these specific functions. Hence this change
> > is wrong regardless of what the comment on the struct xfs_flock64_t
> > says - preallocation and hole punch operations must have a positive
> > length associated with them.
> 
> Andrew, if you agree that this second change is unnecessary go ahead and remove
> it and repost.  Otherwise,

I didn't say it was unnecessary - I said it was wrong. We shouldn't
even be getting as far as the xfs_tosspages() call if bf_len is zero
or negative. That's the bug that needs fixing in this function.

Cheers,

Dave.
-- 
Dave Chinner
david@fromorbit.com

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