Re: [PATCH 2/4] readv.2: Document RWF_ATOMIC flag
From: Dave Chinner <david@fromorbit.com>
Date: 2023-10-04 22:48:31
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On Wed, Oct 04, 2023 at 09:47:24AM +0100, John Garry wrote:
On 03/10/2023 20:25, Bart Van Assche wrote:quoted
On 9/29/23 02:37, John Garry wrote:quoted
+.BR RWF_ATOMIC " (since Linux 6.7)" +Allows block-based filesystems to indicate that write operations will be issued +with torn-write protection. Torn-write protection means that for a power or any +other hardware failure, all or none of the data from the write will be stored, +but never a mix of old and new data. This flag is meaningful only for +.BR pwritev2 (), +and its effect applies only to the data range written by the system call. +The total write length must be power-of-2 and must be sized between +stx_atomic_write_unit_min and stx_atomic_write_unit_max, both inclusive. The +write must be at a natural offset within the file with respect to the total +write length. Torn-write protection only works with +.B O_DIRECT +flag, i.e. buffered writes are not supported. To guarantee consistency from +the write between a file's in-core state with the storage device,It seems wrong to me to start the first sentence with "Allows". Atomic behavior should be mandatory if RWF_ATOMIC has been set.Yes, I agree that this has been poorly worded. Flag RWF_ATOMIC does not indicate anything. I will fix it.quoted
Additionally, shouldn't it be documented what value will be stored in errno if the atomic write has been rejected?So I was treating all atomic writes errors which don't follow the "rules" as low-level I/O errors, which is -EIO. However, yes, I can document this. Further to that, based on description of an error for O_DIRECT, which is to return -EINVAL for misaligned, I think that -EINVAL may be better for any atomic write rule violations. OK?
Agreed - I was going to make that comment myself about using EINVAL instead of EIO... -Dave. -- Dave Chinner david@fromorbit.com