Re: [PATCH 4/8] vmscan: Do not writeback filesystem pages in direct reclaim

[Johannes Weiner <hannes@cmpxchg.org>]

On Tue, Jul 20, 2010 at 02:45:56PM +0100, Mel Gorman wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 20, 2010 at 12:14:20AM +0200, Johannes Weiner wrote:
> > > @@ -639,6 +694,9 @@ static noinline_for_stack void free_page_list(struct list_head *free_pages)
> > >  	pagevec_free(&freed_pvec);
> > >  }
> > >  
> > > +/* Direct lumpy reclaim waits up to 5 seconds for background cleaning */
> > > +#define MAX_SWAP_CLEAN_WAIT 50
> > > +
> > >  /*
> > >   * shrink_page_list() returns the number of reclaimed pages
> > >   */
> > > @@ -646,13 +704,19 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(struct list_head *page_list,
> > >  					struct scan_control *sc,
> > >  					enum pageout_io sync_writeback)
> > >  {
> > > -	LIST_HEAD(ret_pages);
> > >  	LIST_HEAD(free_pages);
> > > -	int pgactivate = 0;
> > > +	LIST_HEAD(putback_pages);
> > > +	LIST_HEAD(dirty_pages);
> > > +	int pgactivate;
> > > +	int dirty_isolated = 0;
> > > +	unsigned long nr_dirty;
> > >  	unsigned long nr_reclaimed = 0;
> > >  
> > > +	pgactivate = 0;
> > >  	cond_resched();
> > >  
> > > +restart_dirty:
> > > +	nr_dirty = 0;
> > >  	while (!list_empty(page_list)) {
> > >  		enum page_references references;
> > >  		struct address_space *mapping;
> > > @@ -741,7 +805,19 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(struct list_head *page_list,
> > >  			}
> > >  		}
> > >  
> > > -		if (PageDirty(page)) {
> > > +		if (PageDirty(page))  {
> > > +			/*
> > > +			 * If the caller cannot writeback pages, dirty pages
> > > +			 * are put on a separate list for cleaning by either
> > > +			 * a flusher thread or kswapd
> > > +			 */
> > > +			if (!reclaim_can_writeback(sc, page)) {
> > > +				list_add(&page->lru, &dirty_pages);
> > > +				unlock_page(page);
> > > +				nr_dirty++;
> > > +				goto keep_dirty;
> > > +			}
> > > +
> > >  			if (references == PAGEREF_RECLAIM_CLEAN)
> > >  				goto keep_locked;
> > >  			if (!may_enter_fs)
> > > @@ -852,13 +928,39 @@ activate_locked:
> > >  keep_locked:
> > >  		unlock_page(page);
> > >  keep:
> > > -		list_add(&page->lru, &ret_pages);
> > > +		list_add(&page->lru, &putback_pages);
> > > +keep_dirty:
> > >  		VM_BUG_ON(PageLRU(page) || PageUnevictable(page));
> > >  	}
> > >  
> > > +	if (dirty_isolated < MAX_SWAP_CLEAN_WAIT && !list_empty(&dirty_pages)) {
> > > +		/*
> > > +		 * Wakeup a flusher thread to clean at least as many dirty
> > > +		 * pages as encountered by direct reclaim. Wait on congestion
> > > +		 * to throttle processes cleaning dirty pages
> > > +		 */
> > > +		wakeup_flusher_threads(nr_dirty);
> > > +		congestion_wait(BLK_RW_ASYNC, HZ/10);
> > > +
> > > +		/*
> > > +		 * As lumpy reclaim and memcg targets specific pages, wait on
> > > +		 * them to be cleaned and try reclaim again.
> > > +		 */
> > > +		if (sync_writeback == PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC ||
> > > +						sc->mem_cgroup != NULL) {
> > > +			dirty_isolated++;
> > > +			list_splice(&dirty_pages, page_list);
> > > +			INIT_LIST_HEAD(&dirty_pages);
> > > +			goto restart_dirty;
> > > +		}
> > > +	}
> > 
> > I think it would turn out more natural to just return dirty pages on
> > page_list and have the whole looping logic in shrink_inactive_list().
> > 
> > Mixing dirty pages with other 'please try again' pages is probably not
> > so bad anyway, it means we could retry all temporary unavailable pages
> > instead of twiddling thumbs over that particular bunch of pages until
> > the flushers catch up.
> > 
> > What do you think?
> > 
> 
> It's worth considering! It won't be very tidy but it's workable. The reason
> it is not tidy is that dirty pages and pages that couldn't be paged will be
> on the same list so they whole lot will need to be recycled. We'd record in
> scan_control though that there were pages that need to be retried and loop
> based on that value. That is managable though.

Recycling all of them is what I had in mind, yeah.  But...

> The reason why I did it this way was because of lumpy reclaim and memcg
> requiring specific pages. I considered lumpy reclaim to be the more common
> case. In that case, it's removing potentially a large number of pages from
> the LRU that are contiguous. If some of those are dirty and it selects more
> contiguous ranges for reclaim, I'd worry that lumpy reclaim would trash the
> system even worse than it currently does when the system is under load. Hence,
> this wait and retry loop is done instead of returning and isolating more pages.

I think here we missed each other.  I don't want the loop to be _that_
much more in the outer scope that isolation is repeated as well.  What
I had in mind is the attached patch.  It is not tested and hacked up
rather quickly due to time constraints, sorry, but you should get the
idea.  I hope I did not miss anything fundamental.

Note that since only kswapd enters pageout() anymore, everything
depending on PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC in there is moot, since there are no sync
cycles for kswapd.  Just to mitigate the WTF-count on the patch :-)

	Hannes

--- a/mm/vmscan.c
+++ b/mm/vmscan.c
@@ -386,21 +386,17 @@ static pageout_t pageout(struct page *pa
 			ClearPageReclaim(page);
 			return PAGE_ACTIVATE;
 		}
-
-		/*
-		 * Wait on writeback if requested to. This happens when
-		 * direct reclaiming a large contiguous area and the
-		 * first attempt to free a range of pages fails.
-		 */
-		if (PageWriteback(page) && sync_writeback == PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC)
-			wait_on_page_writeback(page);
-
 		if (!PageWriteback(page)) {
 			/* synchronous write or broken a_ops? */
 			ClearPageReclaim(page);
 		}
 		trace_mm_vmscan_writepage(page,
 			page_is_file_cache(page),
+			/*
+			 * Humm.  Only kswapd comes here and for
+			 * kswapd there never is a PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC
+			 * cycle...
+			 */
 			sync_writeback == PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC);
 		inc_zone_page_state(page, NR_VMSCAN_WRITE);
 		return PAGE_SUCCESS;
@@ -643,12 +639,14 @@ static noinline_for_stack void free_page
  * shrink_page_list() returns the number of reclaimed pages
  */
 static unsigned long shrink_page_list(struct list_head *page_list,
-					struct scan_control *sc,
-					enum pageout_io sync_writeback)
+				      struct scan_control *sc,
+				      enum pageout_io sync_writeback,
+				      int *dirty_seen)
 {
 	LIST_HEAD(ret_pages);
 	LIST_HEAD(free_pages);
 	int pgactivate = 0;
+	unsigned long nr_dirty = 0;
 	unsigned long nr_reclaimed = 0;
 
 	cond_resched();
@@ -657,7 +655,7 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(st
 		enum page_references references;
 		struct address_space *mapping;
 		struct page *page;
-		int may_enter_fs;
+		int may_pageout;
 
 		cond_resched();
 
@@ -681,10 +679,15 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(st
 		if (page_mapped(page) || PageSwapCache(page))
 			sc->nr_scanned++;
 
-		may_enter_fs = (sc->gfp_mask & __GFP_FS) ||
+		/*
+		 * To prevent stack overflows, only kswapd can enter
+		 * the filesystem.  Swap IO is always fine (for now).
+		 */
+		may_pageout = current_is_kswapd() ||
 			(PageSwapCache(page) && (sc->gfp_mask & __GFP_IO));
 
 		if (PageWriteback(page)) {
+			int may_wait;
 			/*
 			 * Synchronous reclaim is performed in two passes,
 			 * first an asynchronous pass over the list to
@@ -693,7 +696,8 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(st
 			 * for any page for which writeback has already
 			 * started.
 			 */
-			if (sync_writeback == PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC && may_enter_fs)
+			may_wait = (sc->gfp_mask & __GFP_FS) || may_pageout;
+			if (sync_writeback == PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC && may_wait)
 				wait_on_page_writeback(page);
 			else
 				goto keep_locked;
@@ -719,7 +723,7 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(st
 				goto keep_locked;
 			if (!add_to_swap(page))
 				goto activate_locked;
-			may_enter_fs = 1;
+			may_pageout = 1;
 		}
 
 		mapping = page_mapping(page);
@@ -742,9 +746,11 @@ static unsigned long shrink_page_list(st
 		}
 
 		if (PageDirty(page)) {
+			nr_dirty++;
+
 			if (references == PAGEREF_RECLAIM_CLEAN)
 				goto keep_locked;
-			if (!may_enter_fs)
+			if (!may_pageout)
 				goto keep_locked;
 			if (!sc->may_writepage)
 				goto keep_locked;
@@ -860,6 +866,7 @@ keep:
 
 	list_splice(&ret_pages, page_list);
 	count_vm_events(PGACTIVATE, pgactivate);
+	*dirty_seen = nr_dirty;
 	return nr_reclaimed;
 }
 
@@ -1232,6 +1239,9 @@ static noinline_for_stack void update_is
 	reclaim_stat->recent_scanned[1] += *nr_file;
 }
 
+/* Direct lumpy reclaim waits up to 5 seconds for background cleaning */
+#define MAX_SWAP_CLEAN_WAIT 50
+
 /*
  * shrink_inactive_list() is a helper for shrink_zone().  It returns the number
  * of reclaimed pages
@@ -1247,6 +1257,7 @@ shrink_inactive_list(unsigned long nr_to
 	unsigned long nr_active;
 	unsigned long nr_anon;
 	unsigned long nr_file;
+	unsigned long nr_dirty;
 
 	while (unlikely(too_many_isolated(zone, file, sc))) {
 		congestion_wait(BLK_RW_ASYNC, HZ/10);
@@ -1295,26 +1306,34 @@ shrink_inactive_list(unsigned long nr_to
 
 	spin_unlock_irq(&zone->lru_lock);
 
-	nr_reclaimed = shrink_page_list(&page_list, sc, PAGEOUT_IO_ASYNC);
-
+	nr_reclaimed = shrink_page_list(&page_list, sc,
+					PAGEOUT_IO_ASYNC,
+					&nr_dirty);
 	/*
 	 * If we are direct reclaiming for contiguous pages and we do
 	 * not reclaim everything in the list, try again and wait
 	 * for IO to complete. This will stall high-order allocations
 	 * but that should be acceptable to the caller
 	 */
-	if (nr_reclaimed < nr_taken && !current_is_kswapd() &&
-			sc->lumpy_reclaim_mode) {
-		congestion_wait(BLK_RW_ASYNC, HZ/10);
+	if (!current_is_kswapd() && sc->lumpy_reclaim_mode || sc->mem_cgroup) {
+		int dirty_retry = MAX_SWAP_CLEAN_WAIT;
 
-		/*
-		 * The attempt at page out may have made some
-		 * of the pages active, mark them inactive again.
-		 */
-		nr_active = clear_active_flags(&page_list, NULL);
-		count_vm_events(PGDEACTIVATE, nr_active);
+		while (nr_reclaimed < nr_taken && nr_dirty && dirty_retry--) {
+			wakeup_flusher_threads(nr_dirty);
+			congestion_wait(BLK_RW_ASYNC, HZ/10);
+			/*
+			 * The attempt at page out may have made some
+			 * of the pages active, mark them inactive again.
+			 *
+			 * Humm.  Still needed?
+			 */
+			nr_active = clear_active_flags(&page_list, NULL);
+			count_vm_events(PGDEACTIVATE, nr_active);
 
-		nr_reclaimed += shrink_page_list(&page_list, sc, PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC);
+			nr_reclaimed += shrink_page_list(&page_list, sc,
+							 PAGEOUT_IO_SYNC,
+							 &nr_dirty);
+		}
 	}
 
 	local_irq_disable();

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