From 2da02997e08d3efe8174c7a47696e6f7cbe69ba9 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: David Rientjes Date: Tue, 6 Jan 2009 14:39:31 -0800 Subject: mm: add dirty_background_bytes and dirty_bytes sysctls This change introduces two new sysctls to /proc/sys/vm: dirty_background_bytes and dirty_bytes. dirty_background_bytes is the counterpart to dirty_background_ratio and dirty_bytes is the counterpart to dirty_ratio. With growing memory capacities of individual machines, it's no longer sufficient to specify dirty thresholds as a percentage of the amount of dirtyable memory over the entire system. dirty_background_bytes and dirty_bytes specify quantities of memory, in bytes, that represent the dirty limits for the entire system. If either of these values is set, its value represents the amount of dirty memory that is needed to commence either background or direct writeback. When a `bytes' or `ratio' file is written, its counterpart becomes a function of the written value. For example, if dirty_bytes is written to be 8096, 8K of memory is required to commence direct writeback. dirty_ratio is then functionally equivalent to 8K / the amount of dirtyable memory: dirtyable_memory = free pages + mapped pages + file cache dirty_background_bytes = dirty_background_ratio * dirtyable_memory -or- dirty_background_ratio = dirty_background_bytes / dirtyable_memory AND dirty_bytes = dirty_ratio * dirtyable_memory -or- dirty_ratio = dirty_bytes / dirtyable_memory Only one of dirty_background_bytes and dirty_background_ratio may be specified at a time, and only one of dirty_bytes and dirty_ratio may be specified. When one sysctl is written, the other appears as 0 when read. The `bytes' files operate on a page size granularity since dirty limits are compared with ZVC values, which are in page units. Prior to this change, the minimum dirty_ratio was 5 as implemented by get_dirty_limits() although /proc/sys/vm/dirty_ratio would show any user written value between 0 and 100. This restriction is maintained, but dirty_bytes has a lower limit of only one page. Also prior to this change, the dirty_background_ratio could not equal or exceed dirty_ratio. This restriction is maintained in addition to restricting dirty_background_bytes. If either background threshold equals or exceeds that of the dirty threshold, it is implicitly set to half the dirty threshold. Acked-by: Peter Zijlstra Cc: Dave Chinner Cc: Christoph Lameter Signed-off-by: David Rientjes Cc: Andrea Righi Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds --- Documentation/filesystems/proc.txt | 26 +++++++++++++++++++++++++- 1 file changed, 25 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-) (limited to 'Documentation/filesystems') diff --git a/Documentation/filesystems/proc.txt b/Documentation/filesystems/proc.txt index 71df353e367..32e94635484 100644 --- a/Documentation/filesystems/proc.txt +++ b/Documentation/filesystems/proc.txt @@ -1385,6 +1385,15 @@ swapcache reclaim. Decreasing vfs_cache_pressure causes the kernel to prefer to retain dentry and inode caches. Increasing vfs_cache_pressure beyond 100 causes the kernel to prefer to reclaim dentries and inodes. +dirty_background_bytes +---------------------- + +Contains the amount of dirty memory at which the pdflush background writeback +daemon will start writeback. + +If dirty_background_bytes is written, dirty_background_ratio becomes a function +of its value (dirty_background_bytes / the amount of dirtyable system memory). + dirty_background_ratio ---------------------- @@ -1393,14 +1402,29 @@ pages + file cache, not including locked pages and HugePages), the number of pages at which the pdflush background writeback daemon will start writing out dirty data. +If dirty_background_ratio is written, dirty_background_bytes becomes a function +of its value (dirty_background_ratio * the amount of dirtyable system memory). + +dirty_bytes +----------- + +Contains the amount of dirty memory at which a process generating disk writes +will itself start writeback. + +If dirty_bytes is written, dirty_ratio becomes a function of its value +(dirty_bytes / the amount of dirtyable system memory). + dirty_ratio ------------------ +----------- Contains, as a percentage of the dirtyable system memory (free pages + mapped pages + file cache, not including locked pages and HugePages), the number of pages at which a process which is generating disk writes will itself start writing out dirty data. +If dirty_ratio is written, dirty_bytes becomes a function of its value +(dirty_ratio * the amount of dirtyable system memory). + dirty_writeback_centisecs ------------------------- -- cgit v1.2.3-70-g09d2