summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
path: root/Documentation/filesystems
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
authorJan Kara <jack@suse.cz>2021-08-16 12:57:07 +0300
committerTheodore Ts'o <tytso@mit.edu>2021-08-31 06:36:51 +0300
commit3a6541e97c035dba90cdf37169d73b2d8057e55d (patch)
tree7a98a31422d7d5dcc9bd16ac7ff422be13a000ae /Documentation/filesystems
parent02f310fcf47fa9311d6ba2946a8d19e7d7d11f37 (diff)
downloadlinux-3a6541e97c035dba90cdf37169d73b2d8057e55d.tar.xz
ext4: Orphan file documentation
Add documentation about the orphan file feature. Reviewed-by: Theodore Ts'o <tytso@mit.edu> Signed-off-by: Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz> Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20210816095713.16537-4-jack@suse.cz Signed-off-by: Theodore Ts'o <tytso@mit.edu>
Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation/filesystems')
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/ext4/globals.rst1
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/ext4/inodes.rst10
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/ext4/orphan.rst52
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/ext4/special_inodes.rst17
-rw-r--r--Documentation/filesystems/ext4/super.rst15
5 files changed, 89 insertions, 6 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/globals.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/globals.rst
index 368bf7662b96..b17418974fd3 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/globals.rst
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/globals.rst
@@ -11,3 +11,4 @@ have static metadata at fixed locations.
.. include:: bitmaps.rst
.. include:: mmp.rst
.. include:: journal.rst
+.. include:: orphan.rst
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/inodes.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/inodes.rst
index a65baffb4ebf..6c5ce666e63f 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/inodes.rst
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/inodes.rst
@@ -498,11 +498,11 @@ structure -- inode change time (ctime), access time (atime), data
modification time (mtime), and deletion time (dtime). The four fields
are 32-bit signed integers that represent seconds since the Unix epoch
(1970-01-01 00:00:00 GMT), which means that the fields will overflow in
-January 2038. For inodes that are not linked from any directory but are
-still open (orphan inodes), the dtime field is overloaded for use with
-the orphan list. The superblock field ``s_last_orphan`` points to the
-first inode in the orphan list; dtime is then the number of the next
-orphaned inode, or zero if there are no more orphans.
+January 2038. If the filesystem does not have orphan_file feature, inodes
+that are not linked from any directory but are still open (orphan inodes) have
+the dtime field overloaded for use with the orphan list. The superblock field
+``s_last_orphan`` points to the first inode in the orphan list; dtime is then
+the number of the next orphaned inode, or zero if there are no more orphans.
If the inode structure size ``sb->s_inode_size`` is larger than 128
bytes and the ``i_inode_extra`` field is large enough to encompass the
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/orphan.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/orphan.rst
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..bb19ecd1b626
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/orphan.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,52 @@
+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
+
+Orphan file
+-----------
+
+In unix there can inodes that are unlinked from directory hierarchy but that
+are still alive because they are open. In case of crash the filesystem has to
+clean up these inodes as otherwise they (and the blocks referenced from them)
+would leak. Similarly if we truncate or extend the file, we need not be able
+to perform the operation in a single journalling transaction. In such case we
+track the inode as orphan so that in case of crash extra blocks allocated to
+the file get truncated.
+
+Traditionally ext4 tracks orphan inodes in a form of single linked list where
+superblock contains the inode number of the last orphan inode (s\_last\_orphan
+field) and then each inode contains inode number of the previously orphaned
+inode (we overload i\_dtime inode field for this). However this filesystem
+global single linked list is a scalability bottleneck for workloads that result
+in heavy creation of orphan inodes. When orphan file feature
+(COMPAT\_ORPHAN\_FILE) is enabled, the filesystem has a special inode
+(referenced from the superblock through s\_orphan_file_inum) with several
+blocks. Each of these blocks has a structure:
+
+.. list-table::
+ :widths: 8 8 24 40
+ :header-rows: 1
+
+ * - Offset
+ - Type
+ - Name
+ - Description
+ * - 0x0
+ - Array of \_\_le32 entries
+ - Orphan inode entries
+ - Each \_\_le32 entry is either empty (0) or it contains inode number of
+ an orphan inode.
+ * - blocksize - 8
+ - \_\_le32
+ - ob\_magic
+ - Magic value stored in orphan block tail (0x0b10ca04)
+ * - blocksize - 4
+ - \_\_le32
+ - ob\_checksum
+ - Checksum of the orphan block.
+
+When a filesystem with orphan file feature is writeably mounted, we set
+RO\_COMPAT\_ORPHAN\_PRESENT feature in the superblock to indicate there may
+be valid orphan entries. In case we see this feature when mounting the
+filesystem, we read the whole orphan file and process all orphan inodes found
+there as usual. When cleanly unmounting the filesystem we remove the
+RO\_COMPAT\_ORPHAN\_PRESENT feature to avoid unnecessary scanning of the orphan
+file and also make the filesystem fully compatible with older kernels.
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/special_inodes.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/special_inodes.rst
index 9061aabba827..94f304e3a0a7 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/special_inodes.rst
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/special_inodes.rst
@@ -36,3 +36,20 @@ ext4 reserves some inode for special features, as follows:
* - 11
- Traditional first non-reserved inode. Usually this is the lost+found directory. See s\_first\_ino in the superblock.
+Note that there are also some inodes allocated from non-reserved inode numbers
+for other filesystem features which are not referenced from standard directory
+hierarchy. These are generally reference from the superblock. They are:
+
+.. list-table::
+ :widths: 20 50
+ :header-rows: 1
+
+ * - Superblock field
+ - Description
+
+ * - s\_lpf\_ino
+ - Inode number of lost+found directory.
+ * - s\_prj\_quota\_inum
+ - Inode number of quota file tracking project quotas
+ * - s\_orphan\_file\_inum
+ - Inode number of file tracking orphan inodes.
diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/super.rst b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/super.rst
index 2eb1ab20498d..f6a548e957bb 100644
--- a/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/super.rst
+++ b/Documentation/filesystems/ext4/super.rst
@@ -479,7 +479,11 @@ The ext4 superblock is laid out as follows in
- Filename charset encoding flags.
* - 0x280
- \_\_le32
- - s\_reserved[95]
+ - s\_orphan\_file\_inum
+ - Orphan file inode number.
+ * - 0x284
+ - \_\_le32
+ - s\_reserved[94]
- Padding to the end of the block.
* - 0x3FC
- \_\_le32
@@ -603,6 +607,11 @@ following:
the journal, JBD2 incompat feature
(JBD2\_FEATURE\_INCOMPAT\_FAST\_COMMIT) gets
set (COMPAT\_FAST\_COMMIT).
+ * - 0x1000
+ - Orphan file allocated. This is the special file for more efficient
+ tracking of unlinked but still open inodes. When there may be any
+ entries in the file, we additionally set proper rocompat feature
+ (RO\_COMPAT\_ORPHAN\_PRESENT).
.. _super_incompat:
@@ -713,6 +722,10 @@ the following:
- Filesystem tracks project quotas. (RO\_COMPAT\_PROJECT)
* - 0x8000
- Verity inodes may be present on the filesystem. (RO\_COMPAT\_VERITY)
+ * - 0x10000
+ - Indicates orphan file may have valid orphan entries and thus we need
+ to clean them up when mounting the filesystem
+ (RO\_COMPAT\_ORPHAN\_PRESENT).
.. _super_def_hash: