[Yaffs] data blocks lost between unmount and mount
Blair Barnett
bbarnett at circumnavnetworks.com
Wed Oct 5 00:25:39 BST 2005
On Tue, 2005-10-04 at 13:14, Charles Manning wrote:
> On Wednesday 05 October 2005 04:51, Blair Barnett wrote:
>
> > The system has four partitions on the NAND (kernel image, root,
> > application, spare). After booting up and mounting root, application and
> > the spare partition, I create a file in the spare partition. Size
> > doesn't matter in this case. :-) A df command reveals that indeed some
> > blocks have been allocated to this file and all is well. Now if I remove
> > the file, a df command shows that indeed the blocks have been returned
> > to the free list (I know this is not exactly the case as the blocks have
> > all been "soft deleted" and waiting for GC). Now if I create another
> > file, the aforementioned blocks get GC'ed and df again shows that all is
> > right with the file system. If, however, I remove a file, then unmount
> > the file system, then mount it, df shows that the blocks the were "soft
> > deleted" are now marked as used (never to be returned to the free list,
> > as far as my tests show).
>
> Someone reported something similar recently, but did not seem to have come
> back with the requested debug info.
>
> I will do some investigation anyway.
>
> After you have deleted a file (even if it is only soft deleted), this is free
> space from a user perspective and should show up as being available under df.
> mount/unmount should not change df status.
>
> ie
> You should observe something like:
>
> * df. Shows 5MB free
> * dd to create a 1MB file
> *df. Shows 4MB free
> * rm file.
> * df shows 5MB free.
This works as stated above. Add the step of unmounting and mounting the
partition and you'll see that df shows 4 MB free (you lose the 1 MB of
soft deleted files *forever*, or at least until you do a
flash_eraseall).
>
> The only valid reason for df showing something else is if blocks got lost due
> to being retired because they had ECC errors.
>
> >
> > My question is shouldn't the unmount or mount code path cause GC to run
> > and return these "soft deleted" blocks back to the free list?
>
> Mounting/unmounting does not cause GC to run. GC only runs as a side effect of
> when you do any writing operations.
>
> Running gc at mount would only slow down mount time and would break the
> benefits of deferred GC.
Good point. This design decision is a very good one.
>
>
> >
> > Am I missing something? This unmount/mount block lost is filling our
> > application file system nightly.
>
> Do you get any warnings from mtd?
None at all.
>
> -- Charles
>
Hi Charles,
Here's a possible fix to the yaffs2 "losing blocks between
mounts/unmounts". This may not be the optimum way to fix it, but it
works for me. I just made yaffs_ScanBackwards() handle soft deleted
files just like yaffs_Scan(). Now my kernel works the same for both 512
and 2K page devices AND df works.
In looking through yaffs_Scan() and yaffs_ScanBackward(), it appears to
me as if you (or someone else) tried to get one scanning method to work,
which I think is admirable and "the right way to go"(TM). Since we call
yaffs_Scan() based on whether we're on a yaffs2 device or not, we can
probably safely remove all the "isYaffs2" tests in the yaffs_Scan()
code.
thanks again,
Blair
========================snip========================
diff -Naur yaffs2/yaffs_guts.c yaffs2_fixed/yaffs_guts.c
--- yaffs2/yaffs_guts.c 2005-09-19 22:08:50.000000000 -0700
+++ yaffs2_fixed/yaffs_guts.c 2005-10-04 15:56:56.000000000 -0700
@@ -1657,13 +1657,8 @@
YBUG();
}
- /* TODO: Do we need this different handling for YAFFS2 and
YAFFS1?? */
- if (obj->myDev->isYaffs2) {
- unlinkOp = (newDir == obj->myDev->unlinkedDir);
- } else {
- unlinkOp = (newDir == obj->myDev->unlinkedDir
+ unlinkOp = (newDir == obj->myDev->unlinkedDir
&& obj->variantType ==
YAFFS_OBJECT_TYPE_FILE);
- }
deleteOp = (newDir == obj->myDev->deletedDir);
@@ -4194,16 +4189,12 @@
yaffs_AddObjectToDirectory(parent, in);
- if (0 && (parent ==
dev->deletedDir ||
- parent ==
dev->unlinkedDir)) {-
in->deleted = 1; /* If it is unlinked at start up then it wants
deleting */
- dev->nDeletedFiles++;
- }
/* Note re hardlinks.
- * Since we might scan a
hardlink before its equivalent object is scanned
- * we put them all in a list.
- * After scanning is complete,
we should have all the objects, so we run through this
- * list and fix up all the
chains.
+ * Since we might scan a
hardlink before its equivalent
+ * object is scanned we put them
all in a list.
+ * After scanning is complete,
we should have all
+ * the objects, so we run
through this list and fix up
+ * all the chains.
*/
switch (in->variantType) {
@@ -4762,22 +4753,17 @@
yaffs_AddObjectToDirectory(parent, in);
- if ((parent == dev->deletedDir
||
- parent ==
dev->unlinkedDir)) {
- /* If it is unlinked at
start up then it wants deleting */
- in->deleted = 1;
- }
-
if (oh->isShrink) {
/* Mark the block as
having a shrinkHeader */
bi->hasShrinkHeader = 1;
}
/* Note re hardlinks.
- * Since we might scan a
hardlink before its equivalent object is scanned
- * we put them all in a list.
- * After scanning is complete,
we should have all the objects, so we run
- * through this list and fix up
all the chains.
+ * Since we might scan a
hardlink before its equivalent
+ * object is scanned we put them
all in a list.
+ * After scanning is complete,
we should have all
+ * the objects, so we run
through this list and
+ * fix up all the chains.
*/
switch (in->variantType) {
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