Re: [PATCH 1/1] mm: introduce process_reap system call

Suren Baghdasaryan
2021-07-01T23:00:05Z

On Wed, Jun 30, 2021 at 5:44 PM Andy Lutomirski <luto@kernel.org> wrote:
>
> On Wed, Jun 30, 2021 at 2:45 PM Johannes Weiner <hannes@cmpxchg.org> wrote:
> >
> > On Wed, Jun 30, 2021 at 11:51:36AM -0700, Suren Baghdasaryan wrote:
> > > On Wed, Jun 30, 2021 at 11:26 AM Andy Lutomirski <luto@kernel.org> wrote:
> > > > Also, please consider removing all mention of the word "reap" from the
> > > > user API. For better or for worse, "reap" in UNIX refers to what
> > > > happens when a dead task gets wait()ed. I sincerely wish I could go
> > > > back in time and gently encourage whomever invented that particular
> > > > abomination to change their mind, but my time machine doesn't work.
> > >
> > > I see. Thanks for the note. How about process_mem_release() and
> > > replacing reap with release everywhere?
> >
> > I don't quite understand the objection. This syscall works on tasks
> > that are at the end of their life, right? Isn't something like
> > process_mreap() establishing exactly the mental link we want here?
> > Release is less descriptive for what this thing is to be used for.
>
> For better or for worse, "reap" means to make a zombie pid go away.
> From the description, this new operation takes a dying process (not
> necessarily a zombie yet) and aggressively frees its memory. This is
> a different optioneration.
>
> How about "free_dying_process_memory"?

process_mreap sounds definitely better and in line with names like
process_madvise. So maybe we can use it?