From: NeilBrown <neilb@ownmail.net>
To: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>,
Alexander Viro <viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk>,
Christian Brauner <brauner@kernel.org>, Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz>,
Jeff Layton <jlayton@kernel.org>,
Trond Myklebust <trondmy@kernel.org>,
Anna Schumaker <anna@kernel.org>,
Carlos Maiolino <cem@kernel.org>,
Miklos Szeredi <miklos@szeredi.hu>,
Amir Goldstein <amir73il@gmail.com>,
Jan Harkes <jaharkes@cs.cmu.edu>, Hugh Dickins <hughd@google.com>,
Baolin Wang <baolin.wang@linux.alibaba.com>,
David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>,
Marc Dionne <marc.dionne@auristor.com>,
Steve French <sfrench@samba.org>,
Namjae Jeon <linkinjeon@kernel.org>,
Sungjong Seo <sj1557.seo@samsung.com>,
Yuezhang Mo <yuezhang.mo@sony.com>,
Andreas Hindborg <a.hindborg@kernel.org>,
Breno Leitao <leitao@debian.org>, "Theodore Ts'o" <tytso@mit.edu>,
Andreas Dilger <adilger.kernel@dilger.ca>,
Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>,
Masami Hiramatsu <mhiramat@kernel.org>,
Ilya Dryomov <idryomov@gmail.com>,
Alex Markuze <amarkuze@redhat.com>,
Viacheslav Dubeyko <slava@dubeyko.com>,
Tyler Hicks <code@tyhicks.com>,
Andreas Gruenbacher <agruenba@redhat.com>,
Richard Weinberger <richard@nod.at>,
Anton Ivanov <anton.ivanov@cambridgegreys.com>,
Johannes Berg <johannes@sipsolutions.net>,
Jeremy Kerr <jk@ozlabs.org>, Ard Biesheuvel <ardb@kernel.org>
Cc: linux-fsdevel@vger.kernel.org, linux-nfs@vger.kernel.org,
linux-xfs@vger.kernel.org, linux-unionfs@vger.kernel.org,
coda@cs.cmu.edu, linux-mm@kvack.org,
linux-afs@lists.infradead.org, linux-cifs@vger.kernel.org,
linux-ext4@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
linux-trace-kernel@vger.kernel.org, ceph-devel@vger.kernel.org,
ecryptfs@vger.kernel.org, gfs2@lists.linux.dev,
linux-um@lists.infradead.org, linux-efi@vger.kernel.org
Subject: [PATCH 02/53] VFS: enhance d_splice_alias() to handle in-lookup dentries
Date: Fri, 13 Mar 2026 08:11:49 +1100 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260312214330.3885211-3-neilb@ownmail.net> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20260312214330.3885211-1-neilb@ownmail.net>
From: NeilBrown <neil@brown.name>
We currently have three interfaces for attaching existing inodes to
normal filesystems(*).
- d_add() requires an unhashed or in-lookup dentry and doesn't handle
splicing in case a directory already has dentry
- d_instantiate() requires a hashed dentry, and also doesn't handle
splicing.
- d_splice_alias() requires unhashed or in-lookup and does handle
splicing, and can return an alternate dentry.
So there is no interface that supports both hashed and in-lookup, which
is what ->atomic_open needs to deal with.
Some filesystems check for in-lookup in their atomic_open and if found,
perform a ->lookup and can subsequently use d_instantiate() if the
dentry is still negative. Other d_drop() the dentry so they can use
d_splice_alias().
This last will cause a problem for proposed changes to locking which
require the dentry to remain hashed while and operation proceeds on it.
There is also no interface which splices a directory (which might
already have a dentry) to a hashed dentry. Filesystems which need to do
this d_drop() first.
So with this patch d_splice_alias() can handle hashed, unhashed, or
in-lookup dentries. This makes it suitable for ->lookup, ->atomic_open,
and ->mkdir.
As a side effect d_add() will also now handle hashed dentries, but
future patches will remove d_add() as there is no benefit having it as
well as the others.
__d_add() currently contains code that is identical to
__d_instantiate(), so the former is changed to call the later, and both
d_add() and d_instantiate() call __d_add().
* There is also d_make_persistent() for filesystems which are
dcache-based and don't support mkdir, create etc, and
d_instantiate_new() for newly created inodes that are still locked.
Signed-off-by: NeilBrown <neil@brown.name>
---
Documentation/filesystems/vfs.rst | 4 ++--
fs/dcache.c | 31 ++++++++++++-------------------
2 files changed, 14 insertions(+), 21 deletions(-)
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/vfs.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/vfs.rst
index 7c753148af88..d8df0a84cdba 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/vfs.rst
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/vfs.rst
@@ -507,8 +507,8 @@ otherwise noted.
dentry before the first mkdir returns.
If there is any chance this could happen, then the new inode
- should be d_drop()ed and attached with d_splice_alias(). The
- returned dentry (if any) should be returned by ->mkdir().
+ should be attached with d_splice_alias(). The returned
+ dentry (if any) should be returned by ->mkdir().
``rmdir``
called by the rmdir(2) system call. Only required if you want
diff --git a/fs/dcache.c b/fs/dcache.c
index 7ba1801d8132..2a100c616576 100644
--- a/fs/dcache.c
+++ b/fs/dcache.c
@@ -2001,7 +2001,6 @@ static void __d_instantiate(struct dentry *dentry, struct inode *inode)
* (or otherwise set) by the caller to indicate that it is now
* in use by the dcache.
*/
-
void d_instantiate(struct dentry *entry, struct inode * inode)
{
BUG_ON(!hlist_unhashed(&entry->d_u.d_alias));
@@ -2755,18 +2754,14 @@ static inline void __d_add(struct dentry *dentry, struct inode *inode,
dir = dentry->d_parent->d_inode;
n = start_dir_add(dir);
d_wait = __d_lookup_unhash(dentry);
+ __d_rehash(dentry);
+ } else if (d_unhashed(dentry)) {
+ __d_rehash(dentry);
}
if (unlikely(ops))
d_set_d_op(dentry, ops);
- if (inode) {
- unsigned add_flags = d_flags_for_inode(inode);
- hlist_add_head(&dentry->d_u.d_alias, &inode->i_dentry);
- raw_write_seqcount_begin(&dentry->d_seq);
- __d_set_inode_and_type(dentry, inode, add_flags);
- raw_write_seqcount_end(&dentry->d_seq);
- fsnotify_update_flags(dentry);
- }
- __d_rehash(dentry);
+ if (inode)
+ __d_instantiate(dentry, inode);
if (dir)
end_dir_add(dir, n, d_wait);
spin_unlock(&dentry->d_lock);
@@ -3066,8 +3061,6 @@ struct dentry *d_splice_alias_ops(struct inode *inode, struct dentry *dentry,
if (IS_ERR(inode))
return ERR_CAST(inode);
- BUG_ON(!d_unhashed(dentry));
-
if (!inode)
goto out;
@@ -3116,6 +3109,8 @@ struct dentry *d_splice_alias_ops(struct inode *inode, struct dentry *dentry,
* @inode: the inode which may have a disconnected dentry
* @dentry: a negative dentry which we want to point to the inode.
*
+ * @dentry must be negative and may be in-lookup or unhashed or hashed.
+ *
* If inode is a directory and has an IS_ROOT alias, then d_move that in
* place of the given dentry and return it, else simply d_add the inode
* to the dentry and return NULL.
@@ -3123,16 +3118,14 @@ struct dentry *d_splice_alias_ops(struct inode *inode, struct dentry *dentry,
* If a non-IS_ROOT directory is found, the filesystem is corrupt, and
* we should error out: directories can't have multiple aliases.
*
- * This is needed in the lookup routine of any filesystem that is exportable
- * (via knfsd) so that we can build dcache paths to directories effectively.
+ * This should be used to return the result of ->lookup() and to
+ * instantiate the result of ->mkdir(), is often useful for
+ * ->atomic_open, and may be used to instantiate other objects.
*
* If a dentry was found and moved, then it is returned. Otherwise NULL
- * is returned. This matches the expected return value of ->lookup.
+ * is returned. This matches the expected return value of ->lookup and
+ * ->mkdir.
*
- * Cluster filesystems may call this function with a negative, hashed dentry.
- * In that case, we know that the inode will be a regular file, and also this
- * will only occur during atomic_open. So we need to check for the dentry
- * being already hashed only in the final case.
*/
struct dentry *d_splice_alias(struct inode *inode, struct dentry *dentry)
{
--
2.50.0.107.gf914562f5916.dirty
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2026-03-12 21:45 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 58+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2026-03-12 21:11 [PATCH RFC 00/53] lift lookup out of exclive lock for dir ops NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 01/53] VFS: fix various typos in documentation for start_creating start_removing etc NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` NeilBrown [this message]
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 03/53] VFS: allow d_alloc_name() to be used with ->d_hash NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 04/53] VFS: use global wait-queue table for d_alloc_parallel() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 05/53] VFS: introduce d_alloc_noblock() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 06/53] VFS: add d_duplicate() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 07/53] VFS: Add LOOKUP_SHARED flag NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 08/53] VFS/xfs: drop parent lock across d_alloc_parallel() in d_add_ci() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 09/53] nfs: remove d_drop()/d_alloc_parallel() from nfs_atomic_open() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 10/53] nfs: use d_splice_alias() in nfs_link() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 11/53] nfs: don't d_drop() before d_splice_alias() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:11 ` [PATCH 12/53] nfs: don't d_drop() before d_splice_alias() in atomic_create NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 14/53] nfs: use d_alloc_noblock() in silly-rename NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 15/53] nfs: use d_duplicate() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 16/53] ovl: drop dir lock for lookups in impure readdir NeilBrown
2026-03-15 13:51 ` Amir Goldstein
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 17/53] coda: don't d_drop() early NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 18/53] shmem: use d_duplicate() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 19/53] afs: use d_time instead of d_fsdata NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 20/53] afs: don't unhash/rehash dentries during unlink/rename NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 21/53] afs: use d_splice_alias() in afs_vnode_new_inode() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 22/53] afs: use d_alloc_nonblock in afs_sillyrename() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 23/53] afs: lookup_atsys to drop and reclaim lock NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 24/53] afs: use d_duplicate() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 25/53] smb/client: use d_time to store a timestamp in dentry, not d_fsdata NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 26/53] smb/client: don't unhashed and rehash to prevent new opens NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 27/53] smb/client: use d_splice_alias() in atomic_open NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 29/53] exfat: simplify exfat_lookup() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 30/53] configfs: remove d_add() calls before configfs_attach_group() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 31/53] configfs: stop using d_add() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 32/53] ext4: move dcache modifying code out of __ext4_link() NeilBrown
2026-03-17 10:00 ` Jan Kara
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 33/53] ext4: use on-stack dentries in ext4_fc_replay_link_internal() NeilBrown
2026-03-17 9:37 ` Jan Kara
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 34/53] tracefs: stop using d_add() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 35/53] cephfs: " NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 36/53] cephfs: remove d_alloc from CEPH_MDS_OP_LOOKUPNAME handling in ceph_fill_trace() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 37/53] cephfs: Use d_alloc_noblock() in ceph_readdir_prepopulate() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 38/53] cephfs: Don't d_drop() before d_splice_alias() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 39/53] ecryptfs: stop using d_add() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 40/53] gfs2: " NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 41/53] libfs: " NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 42/53] fuse: don't d_drop() before d_splice_alias() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 44/53] hostfs: don't d_drop() before d_splice_alias() in hostfs_mkdir() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 45/53] efivarfs: use d_alloc_name() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 46/53] Remove references to d_add() in documentation and comments NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 47/53] VFS: make d_alloc() local to VFS NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 48/53] VFS: remove d_add() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 49/53] VFS: remove d_rehash() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 50/53] VFS: remove lookup_one() and lookup_noperm() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 51/53] VFS: use d_alloc_parallel() in lookup_one_qstr_excl() NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 52/53] VFS: lift d_alloc_parallel above inode_lock NeilBrown
2026-03-12 21:12 ` [PATCH 53/53] VFS: remove LOOKUP_SHARED NeilBrown
2026-03-12 23:38 ` [PATCH RFC 00/53] lift lookup out of exclive lock for dir ops Steven Rostedt
2026-03-13 0:18 ` NeilBrown
2026-03-12 23:46 ` Linus Torvalds
2026-03-13 0:09 ` NeilBrown
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