tree 16f73cb6f0d95e096154b5f96d120ef2526c43f2
parent d1c3ed669a2d452cacfb48c2d171a1f364dae2ed
author Seiji Aguchi <seiji.aguchi@hds.com> 1357927781 +0000
committer Tony Luck <tony.luck@intel.com> 1357928450 -0800

pstore: Avoid deadlock in panic and emergency-restart path

[Issue]

When pstore is in panic and emergency-restart paths, it may be blocked
in those paths because it simply takes spin_lock.

This is an example scenario which pstore may hang up in a panic path:

 - cpuA grabs psinfo->buf_lock
 - cpuB panics and calls smp_send_stop
 - smp_send_stop sends IRQ to cpuA
 - after 1 second, cpuB gives up on cpuA and sends an NMI instead
 - cpuA is now in an NMI handler while still holding buf_lock
 - cpuB is deadlocked

This case may happen if a firmware has a bug and
cpuA is stuck talking with it more than one second.

Also, this is a similar scenario in an emergency-restart path:

 - cpuA grabs psinfo->buf_lock and stucks in a firmware
 - cpuB kicks emergency-restart via either sysrq-b or hangcheck timer.
   And then, cpuB is deadlocked by taking psinfo->buf_lock again.

[Solution]

This patch avoids the deadlocking issues in both panic and emergency_restart
paths by introducing a function, is_non_blocking_path(), to check if a cpu
can be blocked in current path.

With this patch, pstore is not blocked even if another cpu has
taken a spin_lock, in those paths by changing from spin_lock_irqsave
to spin_trylock_irqsave.

In addition, according to a comment of emergency_restart() in kernel/sys.c,
spin_lock shouldn't be taken in an emergency_restart path to avoid
deadlock. This patch fits the comment below.

<snip>
/**
 *      emergency_restart - reboot the system
 *
 *      Without shutting down any hardware or taking any locks
 *      reboot the system.  This is called when we know we are in
 *      trouble so this is our best effort to reboot.  This is
 *      safe to call in interrupt context.
 */
void emergency_restart(void)
<snip>

Signed-off-by: Seiji Aguchi <seiji.aguchi@hds.com>
Acked-by: Don Zickus <dzickus@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Tony Luck <tony.luck@intel.com>