The metadata low watermark threshold is set by the kernel. But the
kernel depends on userspace to extend the thinpool metadata device when
the threshold is crossed.
Since the metadata low watermark threshold is not visible to userspace,
upon receiving an event, userspace cannot tell that the kernel wants the
metadata device extended, instead of some other eventing condition.
Making it visible (but not settable) enables userspace to affirmatively
know the kernel is asking for a metadata device extension, by comparing
metadata_low_watermark against nr_free_blocks_metadata, also reported in
status.
Current solutions like dmeventd have their own thresholds for extending
the data and metadata devices, and both devices are checked against
their thresholds on each event. This lessens the value of the kernel-set
threshold, since userspace will either extend the metadata device sooner,
when receiving another event; or will receive the metadata lowater event
and do nothing, if dmeventd's threshold is less than the kernel's.
(This second case is dangerous. The metadata lowater event will not be
re-sent, so no further event will be generated before the metadata
device is out if space, unless some other event causes userspace to
recheck its thresholds.)
Signed-off-by: Andy Grover <agrover@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Documentation/device-mapper-/thin-provisioning.txt's "Status" section no
longer reflected the current fitness level of DM thin-provisioning.
That is, DM thinp is no longer "EXPERIMENTAL". It has since seen
considerable improvement, has been fairly widely deployed and has
performed in a robust manner.
Update Documentation to dispel concern raised by potential DM thinp
users.
Reported-by: Drew Hastings <dhastings@crucialwebhost.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Due to user confusion, clarify that it doesn't make sense to try to
create a thin-pool with "read_only" mode enabled.
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Make the format string for thinpool status more correct.
Swap the order of two items to correspond with reality.
Signed-off-by: mulhern <amulhern@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Fixes:
1. The use of "exceeds" when the opposite of exceeds, falls below,
was meant.
2. Properly speaking, a table can not exceed a threshold.
It emphasizes the important point, which is that it is the userspace
daemon's responsibility to check for low free space when a device
is resumed, since it won't get a special event indicating low free
space in that situation.
Signed-off-by: mulhern <amulhern@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
There is currently no way to see that the needs_check flag has been set
in the metadata. Display 'needs_check' in the thin-pool status if it is
set in the thinp metadata.
Also, update thinp documentation.
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Commit 85ad643b ("dm thin: add timeout to stop out-of-data-space mode
holding IO forever") introduced a fixed 60 second timeout. Users may
want to either disable or modify this timeout.
Allow the out-of-data-space timeout to be configured using the
'no_space_timeout' dm-thin-pool module param. Setting it to 0 will
disable the timeout, resulting in IO being queued until more data space
is added to the thin-pool.
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org # 3.14+
The Documentation for the thin provisioning target's held metadata root
feature was incorrect. It is now available and the value for the held
metadata root is in block units (not 512b sectors).
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
If a thin metadata operation fails the current transaction will abort,
whereby causing potential for IO layers up the stack (e.g. filesystems)
to have data loss. As such, set THIN_METADATA_NEEDS_CHECK_FLAG in the
thin metadata's superblock which:
1) requires the user verify the thin metadata is consistent (e.g. use
thin_check, etc)
2) suggests the user verify the thin data is consistent (e.g. use fsck)
The only way to clear the superblock's THIN_METADATA_NEEDS_CHECK_FLAG is
to run thin_repair.
On metadata operation failure: abort current metadata transaction, set
pool in read-only mode, and now set the needs_check flag.
As part of this change, constraints are introduced or relaxed:
* don't allow a pool to transition to write mode if needs_check is set
* don't allow data or metadata space to be resized if needs_check is set
* if a thin pool's metadata space is exhausted: the kernel will now
force the user to take the pool offline for repair before the kernel
will allow the metadata space to be extended.
Also, update Documentation to include information about when the thin
provisioning target commits metadata, how it handles metadata failures
and running out of space.
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
If the pool runs out of data or metadata space, the pool can either
queue or error the IO destined to the data device. The default is to
queue the IO until more space is added.
An admin may now configure the pool to error IO when no space is
available by setting the 'error_if_no_space' feature when loading the
thin-pool table.
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Acked-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Inform users that the data block size can't be any arbitrary number,
i.e. its value must be between 64KB and 1GB. Also, it should be a
multiple of 64KB.
Signed-off-by: Carlos Maiolino <cmaiolino@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
Acked-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Add read-only and fail-io modes to thin provisioning.
If a transaction commit fails the pool's metadata device will transition
to "read-only" mode. If a commit fails once already in read-only mode
the transition to "fail-io" mode occurs.
Once in fail-io mode the pool and all associated thin devices will
report a status of "Fail".
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
This patch implements two new messages that can be sent to the thin
pool target allowing it to take a snapshot of the _metadata_. This,
read-only snapshot can be accessed by userland, concurrently with the
live target.
Only one metadata snapshot can be held at a time. The pool's status
line will give the block location for the current msnap.
Since version 0.1.5 of the userland thin provisioning tools, the
thin_dump program displays the msnap as follows:
thin_dump -m <msnap root> <metadata dev>
Available here: https://github.com/jthornber/thin-provisioning-tools
Now that userland can access the metadata we can do various things
that have traditionally been kernel side tasks:
i) Incremental backups.
By using metadata snapshots we can work out what blocks have
changed over time. Combined with data snapshots we can ensure
the data doesn't change while we back it up.
A short proof of concept script can be found here:
https://github.com/jthornber/thinp-test-suite/blob/master/incremental_backup_example.rb
ii) Migration of thin devices from one pool to another.
iii) Merging snapshots back into an external origin.
iv) Asyncronous replication.
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
Add dm thin target arguments to control discard support.
ignore_discard: Disables discard support
no_discard_passdown: Don't pass discards down to the underlying data
device, but just remove the mapping within the thin provisioning target.
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
Support the use of an external _read only_ device as an origin for a thin
device.
Any read to an unprovisioned area of the thin device will be passed
through to the origin. Writes trigger allocation of new blocks as
usual.
One possible use case for this would be VM hosts that want to run
guests on thinly-provisioned volumes but have the base image on another
device (possibly shared between many VMs).
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
The thin metadata format can only make use of a device that is <=
THIN_METADATA_MAX_SECTORS (currently 15.9375 GB). Therefore, there is no
practical benefit to using a larger device.
However, it may be that other factors impose a certain granularity for
the space that is allocated to a device (E.g. lvm2 can impose a coarse
granularity through the use of large, >= 1 GB, physical extents).
Rather than reject a larger metadata device, during thin-pool device
construction, switch to allowing it but issue a warning if a device
larger than THIN_METADATA_MAX_SECTORS_WARNING (16 GB) is
provided. Any space over 15.9375 GB will not be used.
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
Remove documentation for unimplemented 'trim' message.
I'd planned a 'trim' target message for shrinking thin devices, but
this is better handled via the discard ioctl.
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
Initial EXPERIMENTAL implementation of device-mapper thin provisioning
with snapshot support. The 'thin' target is used to create instances of
the virtual devices that are hosted in the 'thin-pool' target. The
thin-pool target provides data sharing among devices. This sharing is
made possible using the persistent-data library in the previous patch.
The main highlight of this implementation, compared to the previous
implementation of snapshots, is that it allows many virtual devices to
be stored on the same data volume, simplifying administration and
allowing sharing of data between volumes (thus reducing disk usage).
Another big feature is support for arbitrary depth of recursive
snapshots (snapshots of snapshots of snapshots ...). The previous
implementation of snapshots did this by chaining together lookup tables,
and so performance was O(depth). This new implementation uses a single
data structure so we don't get this degradation with depth.
For further information and examples of how to use this, please read
Documentation/device-mapper/thin-provisioning.txt
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <thornber@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
