Re: [RFC v2 1/4] fs: Add generic file system event notifications

Jan Kara
2015-04-28T13:57:03Z

On Mon 27-04-15 17:37:11, Greg KH wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 27, 2015 at 05:08:27PM +0200, Beata Michalska wrote:
> > On 04/27/2015 04:24 PM, Greg KH wrote:
> > > On Mon, Apr 27, 2015 at 01:51:41PM +0200, Beata Michalska wrote:
> > >> Introduce configurable generic interface for file
> > >> system-wide event notifications, to provide file
> > >> systems with a common way of reporting any potential
> > >> issues as they emerge.
> > >>
> > >> The notifications are to be issued through generic
> > >> netlink interface by newly introduced multicast group.
> > >>
> > >> Threshold notifications have been included, allowing
> > >> triggering an event whenever the amount of free space drops
> > >> below a certain level - or levels to be more precise as two
> > >> of them are being supported: the lower and the upper range.
> > >> The notifications work both ways: once the threshold level
> > >> has been reached, an event shall be generated whenever
> > >> the number of available blocks goes up again re-activating
> > >> the threshold.
> > >>
> > >> The interface has been exposed through a vfs. Once mounted,
> > >> it serves as an entry point for the set-up where one can
> > >> register for particular file system events.
> > >>
> > >> Signed-off-by: Beata Michalska <b.michalska@samsung.com>
> > >> ---
> > >> Documentation/filesystems/events.txt | 231 ++++++++++
> > >> fs/Makefile | 1 +
> > >> fs/events/Makefile | 6 +
> > >> fs/events/fs_event.c | 770 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> > >> fs/events/fs_event.h | 25 ++
> > >> fs/events/fs_event_netlink.c | 99 +++++
> > >> fs/namespace.c | 1 +
> > >> include/linux/fs.h | 6 +-
> > >> include/linux/fs_event.h | 58 +++
> > >> include/uapi/linux/fs_event.h | 54 +++
> > >> include/uapi/linux/genetlink.h | 1 +
> > >> net/netlink/genetlink.c | 7 +-
> > >> 12 files changed, 1257 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> > >> create mode 100644 Documentation/filesystems/events.txt
> > >> create mode 100644 fs/events/Makefile
> > >> create mode 100644 fs/events/fs_event.c
> > >> create mode 100644 fs/events/fs_event.h
> > >> create mode 100644 fs/events/fs_event_netlink.c
> > >> create mode 100644 include/linux/fs_event.h
> > >> create mode 100644 include/uapi/linux/fs_event.h
> > >
> > > Any reason why you just don't do uevents for the block devices today,
> > > and not create a new type of netlink message and userspace tool required
> > > to read these?
> >
> > The idea here is to have support for filesystems with no backing device as well.
> > Parsing the message with libnl is really simple and requires few lines of code
> > (sample application has been presented in the initial version of this RFC)
>
> I'm not saying it's not "simple" to parse, just that now you are doing
> something that requires a different tool. If you have a block device,
> you should be able to emit uevents for it, you don't need a backing
> device, we handle virtual filesystems in /sys/block/ just fine :)
>
> People already have tools that listen to libudev for system monitoring
> and management, why require them to hook up to yet-another-library? And
> what is going to provide the ability for multiple userspace tools to
> listen to these netlink messages in case you have more than one program
> that wants to watch for these things (i.e. multiple desktop filesystem
> monitoring tools, system-health checkers, etc.)?
As much as I understand your concerns I'm not convinced uevent interface
is a good fit. There are filesystems that don't have underlying block
device - think of e.g. tmpfs or filesystems working directly on top of
flash devices. These still want to send notification to userspace (one of
primary motivation for this interfaces was so that tmpfs can notify about
something). And creating some fake nodes in /sys/block for tmpfs and
similar filesystems seems like doing more harm than good to me...

Honza

> > Most of the code operates on sb only if it
> > was explicitly asked to, through call from filesystem. There is also
> > a callback notifying of mount being dropped (which proceeds the call to
> > kill_super) that invalidates the object that depends on it.
> > Still, it should be explicitly stated that the sb is being used through
> > bidding up the s_count counter, though that would require taking the
> > sb_lock. AFAIK, one can get the reference to super block but for a particular
> > device. Maybe it would be worth having it more generic (?).
>
> Why not just grab a reference to the sb when you save the pointer, and
> release it when you are done with it? That should handle the lifecycle
> properly. It's always a very bad idea to have a pointer to a reference
> counted object without actually grabbing the reference, as you have no
> idea what is happening with it behind your back.
>
> thanks,
>
> greg k-h
--
Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz>
SUSE Labs, CR