Re: nf_conntrack.acct has no effect

[Patrick McHardy <kaber@trash.net>]

Jan Engelhardt wrote:
> A forum made me (re)aware of
> 
> Mar 15 18:20:25 wild-thing kernel: nf_conntrack version 0.5.0 (16384 buckets, 65536 max)
> Mar 15 18:20:25 wild-thing kernel: CONFIG_NF_CT_ACCT is deprecated and will be removed soon. Plase use
> Mar 15 18:20:25 wild-thing kernel: nf_conntrack.acct=1 kernel paramater, acct=1 nf_conntrack module option or
> Mar 15 18:20:25 wild-thing kernel: sysctl net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_acct=1 to enable it.
> 
> which prompted me to look into this a bit in detail. I was wondering
> which functionality I would lose on not setting nf_conntrack.acct. To
> my surprise, there is no loss of functionality, as the "nf_ct_acct"
> in nf_conntrack_acct.c nor /proc/sys/net/netfilter/nf_conntrack_acct
> which is the accompanied sysctl file cause the packet or byte
> counters to disappear from `conntrack -L` or /proc/net/nf_conntrack.
> 
> Should the message be removed? Should the missing check for
> nf_ct_acct be included?

Currently the default is set based on the old config option.
When unset, no acct-extend is allocated for *new* conntracks.
The old ones that do have an acct-extend are still displayed.
Does that explain your observation?