On Mon Sep 14 05:38:23 EDT 2009, [email protected] wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 11 2009, Ed Cashin wrote:
> > The Documentation/block/barrier.txt information seems geared toward
> > block device drivers that handle I/O requests from the request_queue,
> > and not drivers that handle bios directly by providing their own
> > make_request_fn via blk_queue_make_request.
> > 
> > So I think the section quoted below does not apply to such a
> > bio-handling driver.
> > 
> >   * Currently, no matter which ordered mode is used, there can be only
> >   one barrier request in progress.  All I/O barriers are held off by
> >   block layer until the previous I/O barrier is complete.
> 
> Right, that synchronization does not exist at the bio level.
> 
> > The implication is that when a bio_barrier(bio) is seen by the
> > make_request_fn, it should sleep until any in-progress barrier bio has
> > been completed.  Is that correct?
> 
> Yes, that is correct.

Thanks.

It looks like interested parties like filesystems use
blkdev_issue_flush to generate a barrier, but a bio generated by
blkdev_issue_flush will always be "empty", with no associated I/O to
do.

Can a make_request_fn-style driver count on barrier bios always being
I/O operation free?

-- 
  Ed

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