Re: [GIT PULL v2] Early SLAB fixes for 2.6.31

[Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>]

On Wed, 17 Jun 2009, Pekka Enberg wrote:
> 
> So how does the page allocator fit in this new scheme of things? I have
> been looking at doing the cleanups you and Christoph suggested and it
> seems to me we need a 'system_gfp_mask' that's respected by basically
> everyone, including __might_sleep() and other debugging functions.

So I'm very much ok with the whole "use magic gfp_mask to indicate what 
works at what stage". And yes, I think it makes sense to extend it to the 
page allocator and might_sleep too, because GFP_KERNEL has all the same 
issues regardless of whether it's about page allocation or about slab 
allocators. And any "might_sleep" suppression really does tend to be about 
the exact same thing.

So the only thing I was arguing against wrt Christoph was really that I 
think this thing should be an "internal" thing, and never ever be used as 
a flag for others to decide what to do. We do _not_ want drivers or other 
crazy people using it to decide what state they are running in. 

Keep it simple, and keep it minimal, in other words.

		Linus