| Message ID | 20110421083258.GA26784@infradead.org |
|---|---|
| State | New, archived |
| Headers | show |
Excerpts from Christoph Hellwig's message of 2011-04-21 04:32:58 -0400: > On Wed, Apr 20, 2011 at 02:23:29PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: > But given that you are able to reproduce it, does the following patch > help your latencies? Currently XFS actually does stop I/O when > nr_to_write reaches zero, but only for non-blocking I/O. This behaviour > was introduced in commit efceab1d563153a2b1a6e7d35376241a48126989 > > "xfs: handle negative wbc->nr_to_write during sync writeback" > > and works around issues in the generic writeback code. > > > Index: linux-2.6/fs/xfs/linux-2.6/xfs_aops.c > =================================================================== > --- linux-2.6.orig/fs/xfs/linux-2.6/xfs_aops.c 2011-04-21 10:20:48.303550404 +0200 > +++ linux-2.6/fs/xfs/linux-2.6/xfs_aops.c 2011-04-21 10:20:58.203496773 +0200 > @@ -765,8 +765,7 @@ xfs_convert_page( > SetPageUptodate(page); > > if (count) { > - if (--wbc->nr_to_write <= 0 && > - wbc->sync_mode == WB_SYNC_NONE) > + if (--wbc->nr_to_write <= 0) > done = 1; > } > xfs_start_page_writeback(page, !page_dirty, count); Sorry, this doesn't do it. I think that given what a strange special case this is, we're best off waiting for the IO-less throttling, and maybe changing the code in xfs/ext4 to be a little more seek aware. Or maybe not, it has to get written eventually either way. -chris -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 01:34:44PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: > Sorry, this doesn't do it. I think that given what a strange special > case this is, we're best off waiting for the IO-less throttling, and > maybe changing the code in xfs/ext4 to be a little more seek aware. Or > maybe not, it has to get written eventually either way. I'm not sure what you mean with seek aware. XFS only clusters additional pages that are in the same extent, and in fact only does so for asynchrononous writeback. Not sure how this should be more seek aware. -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
On 2011-04-21, at 11:41 AM, Christoph Hellwig wrote: > On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 01:34:44PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: >> Sorry, this doesn't do it. I think that given what a strange special >> case this is, we're best off waiting for the IO-less throttling, and >> maybe changing the code in xfs/ext4 to be a little more seek aware. Or >> maybe not, it has to get written eventually either way. > > I'm not sure what you mean with seek aware. XFS only clusters > additional pages that are in the same extent, and in fact only does > so for asynchrononous writeback. Not sure how this should be more > seek aware. But doesn't XFS have potentially very large extents, especially in the case of files that were fallocate()'d or linearly written? If there is a single 8GB extent, and then random writes within that extent (seems very database like) grouping the all of the writes in the extent doesn't seem so great. Cheers, Andreas -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Excerpts from Christoph Hellwig's message of 2011-04-21 13:41:21 -0400: > On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 01:34:44PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: > > Sorry, this doesn't do it. I think that given what a strange special > > case this is, we're best off waiting for the IO-less throttling, and > > maybe changing the code in xfs/ext4 to be a little more seek aware. Or > > maybe not, it has to get written eventually either way. > > I'm not sure what you mean with seek aware. XFS only clusters > additional pages that are in the same extent, and in fact only does > so for asynchrononous writeback. Not sure how this should be more > seek aware. > How big are extents? fiemap tells me the file has a single 8GB extent. There's a little room for seeking inside there. -chris -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 11:59:37AM -0600, Andreas Dilger wrote:
> But doesn't XFS have potentially very large extents, especially in the case of files that were fallocate()'d or linearly written? If there is a single 8GB extent, and then random writes within that extent (seems very database like) grouping the all of the writes in the extent doesn't seem so great.
It doesn't cluster any writes in an extent. It only writes out
additional dirty pages directly following that one we were asked to
write out. As soon as we hit a non-dirty page we give up.
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Excerpts from Christoph Hellwig's message of 2011-04-21 14:02:13 -0400: > On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 11:59:37AM -0600, Andreas Dilger wrote: > > But doesn't XFS have potentially very large extents, especially in the case of files that were fallocate()'d or linearly written? If there is a single 8GB extent, and then random writes within that extent (seems very database like) grouping the all of the writes in the extent doesn't seem so great. > > It doesn't cluster any writes in an extent. It only writes out > additional dirty pages directly following that one we were asked to > write out. As soon as we hit a non-dirty page we give up. For this program, they are almost all dirty pages. I tried patching it to give up if we seek but it is still pretty slow. There's something else going on in addition to the xfs clustering being too aggressive. I'll try dropping the clustering completley. -chris -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 02:02:43PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: > For this program, they are almost all dirty pages. > > I tried patching it to give up if we seek but it is still pretty slow. > There's something else going on in addition to the xfs clustering being > too aggressive. I'm not sure where you this beeing to agressive from - it's doing exactly the same amount of I/O as a filesystem writing out a single page from ->writepage or using write_cache_pages (either directly or as a copy) as ->writepages. The only thing special compared to the no ->writepages case is that it's submitting a large I/O from the first ->writepage call. -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Excerpts from Christoph Hellwig's message of 2011-04-21 14:08:05 -0400: > On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 02:02:43PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: > > For this program, they are almost all dirty pages. > > > > I tried patching it to give up if we seek but it is still pretty slow. > > There's something else going on in addition to the xfs clustering being > > too aggressive. > > I'm not sure where you this beeing to agressive from - it's doing > exactly the same amount of I/O as a filesystem writing out a single > page from ->writepage or using write_cache_pages (either directly > or as a copy) as ->writepages. The only thing special compared to > the no ->writepages case is that it's submitting a large I/O > from the first ->writepage call. > Ok, I see what you mean. The clustering code stops once it hits nr_to_write, I missed that. So we shouldn't be doing more than a single writepages call. -chris -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
On 2011-04-21, at 12:29 PM, Chris Mason wrote: > Excerpts from Christoph Hellwig's message of 2011-04-21 14:08:05 -0400: >> On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 02:02:43PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: >>> For this program, they are almost all dirty pages. >>> >>> I tried patching it to give up if we seek but it is still pretty slow. >>> There's something else going on in addition to the xfs clustering being >>> too aggressive. >> >> I'm not sure where you this beeing to agressive from - it's doing >> exactly the same amount of I/O as a filesystem writing out a single >> page from ->writepage or using write_cache_pages (either directly >> or as a copy) as ->writepages. The only thing special compared to >> the no ->writepages case is that it's submitting a large I/O >> from the first ->writepage call. > > Ok, I see what you mean. The clustering code stops once it hits > nr_to_write, I missed that. So we shouldn't be doing more than a single > writepages call. I wonder if it makes sense to disentangle the two processes state in the kernel, by forking the fsync thread before any writes are done. That would avoid penalizing the random writer in the VM/VFS, but means there needs to be some coordination between the threads (e.g. polling for a sentinel file written when the sequential phase is complete). Cheers, Andreas -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Excerpts from Andreas Dilger's message of 2011-04-21 14:43:47 -0400: > On 2011-04-21, at 12:29 PM, Chris Mason wrote: > > Excerpts from Christoph Hellwig's message of 2011-04-21 14:08:05 -0400: > >> On Thu, Apr 21, 2011 at 02:02:43PM -0400, Chris Mason wrote: > >>> For this program, they are almost all dirty pages. > >>> > >>> I tried patching it to give up if we seek but it is still pretty slow. > >>> There's something else going on in addition to the xfs clustering being > >>> too aggressive. > >> > >> I'm not sure where you this beeing to agressive from - it's doing > >> exactly the same amount of I/O as a filesystem writing out a single > >> page from ->writepage or using write_cache_pages (either directly > >> or as a copy) as ->writepages. The only thing special compared to > >> the no ->writepages case is that it's submitting a large I/O > >> from the first ->writepage call. > > > > Ok, I see what you mean. The clustering code stops once it hits > > nr_to_write, I missed that. So we shouldn't be doing more than a single > > writepages call. > > I wonder if it makes sense to disentangle the two processes state in the kernel, by forking the fsync thread before any writes are done. That would avoid penalizing the random writer in the VM/VFS, but means there needs to be some coordination between the threads (e.g. polling for a sentinel file written when the sequential phase is complete). > The test itself may not be realistic, but I actually think its a feature that we end up stuck doing the random buffered ios. Somehow it is much slower than it should be on my box on xfs. This isn't universal, other machines seem to be working fine. -chris -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-ext4" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Index: linux-2.6/fs/xfs/linux-2.6/xfs_aops.c =================================================================== --- linux-2.6.orig/fs/xfs/linux-2.6/xfs_aops.c 2011-04-21 10:20:48.303550404 +0200 +++ linux-2.6/fs/xfs/linux-2.6/xfs_aops.c 2011-04-21 10:20:58.203496773 +0200 @@ -765,8 +765,7 @@ xfs_convert_page( SetPageUptodate(page); if (count) { - if (--wbc->nr_to_write <= 0 && - wbc->sync_mode == WB_SYNC_NONE) + if (--wbc->nr_to_write <= 0) done = 1; } xfs_start_page_writeback(page, !page_dirty, count);