Bug 245042 - make new RHEL5 NFS symlink code use GFP_HIGHUSER for pagecache
Summary: make new RHEL5 NFS symlink code use GFP_HIGHUSER for pagecache
Keywords:
Status: CLOSED ERRATA
Alias: None
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5
Classification: Red Hat
Component: kernel
Version: 5.0
Hardware: All
OS: Linux
low
low
Target Milestone: ---
: ---
Assignee: Jeff Layton
QA Contact: Martin Jenner
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks: 425461
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2007-06-20 17:49 UTC by Jeff Layton
Modified: 2008-05-21 14:44 UTC (History)
3 users (show)

Fixed In Version: RHBA-2008-0314
Doc Type: Bug Fix
Doc Text:
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed: 2008-05-21 14:44:32 UTC
Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:


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Links
System ID Private Priority Status Summary Last Updated
Red Hat Product Errata RHBA-2008:0314 0 normal SHIPPED_LIVE Updated kernel packages for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.2 2008-05-20 18:43:34 UTC

Description Jeff Layton 2007-06-20 17:49:22 UTC
The patch for bug 218718 makes it so that nfs_symlink() allocates a page
destined for pagecache and uses that to hold the name to which the symlink
points. It allocates it using this:

page = alloc_page(GFP_KERNEL);

...but most pagecache pages are allocated using GFP_HIGHUSER. There's no reason
to use normal zone memory for this.

I pushed a patch upstream recently to change this to use GFP_HIGHUSER, but it's
not shown up in Trond's tree or mainline yet. I'd like this to go upstream for a
bit to make sure there are no issues, but eventually we should consider pulling
this back for RHEL5 (maybe for 5.2).

Comment 1 RHEL Program Management 2007-08-22 12:57:02 UTC
This request was evaluated by Red Hat Product Management for inclusion in a Red
Hat Enterprise Linux maintenance release.  Product Management has requested
further review of this request by Red Hat Engineering, for potential
inclusion in a Red Hat Enterprise Linux Update release for currently deployed
products.  This request is not yet committed for inclusion in an Update
release.

Comment 2 Jeff Layton 2007-09-13 15:43:36 UTC
Not sure how best to QA this...

It'll probably come down to installing a 32 bit machine with a large amount of
memory (>1G or so), writing script that creates a ton of symlinks on a NFS
mount, and watching memory statistics as it runs.

Without this patch, normal zone memory should drop much more quickly, while with
this patch, more of these pages should come out of highmem.


Comment 5 Don Zickus 2007-12-14 18:38:35 UTC
in 2.6.18-60.el5
You can download this test kernel from http://people.redhat.com/dzickus/el5

Comment 8 errata-xmlrpc 2008-05-21 14:44:32 UTC
An advisory has been issued which should help the problem
described in this bug report. This report is therefore being
closed with a resolution of ERRATA. For more information
on the solution and/or where to find the updated files,
please follow the link below. You may reopen this bug report
if the solution does not work for you.

http://rhn.redhat.com/errata/RHBA-2008-0314.html



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