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Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -04001BTT - Block Translation Table
2=============================
3
4
51. Introduction
6---------------
7
8Persistent memory based storage is able to perform IO at byte (or more
9accurately, cache line) granularity. However, we often want to expose such
10storage as traditional block devices. The block drivers for persistent memory
11will do exactly this. However, they do not provide any atomicity guarantees.
12Traditional SSDs typically provide protection against torn sectors in hardware,
13using stored energy in capacitors to complete in-flight block writes, or perhaps
14in firmware. We don't have this luxury with persistent memory - if a write is in
15progress, and we experience a power failure, the block will contain a mix of old
16and new data. Applications may not be prepared to handle such a scenario.
17
18The Block Translation Table (BTT) provides atomic sector update semantics for
19persistent memory devices, so that applications that rely on sector writes not
20being torn can continue to do so. The BTT manifests itself as a stacked block
21device, and reserves a portion of the underlying storage for its metadata. At
22the heart of it, is an indirection table that re-maps all the blocks on the
23volume. It can be thought of as an extremely simple file system that only
24provides atomic sector updates.
25
26
272. Static Layout
28----------------
29
30The underlying storage on which a BTT can be laid out is not limited in any way.
31The BTT, however, splits the available space into chunks of up to 512 GiB,
32called "Arenas".
33
34Each arena follows the same layout for its metadata, and all references in an
35arena are internal to it (with the exception of one field that points to the
36next arena). The following depicts the "On-disk" metadata layout:
37
38
39 Backing Store +-------> Arena
40+---------------+ | +------------------+
41| | | | Arena info block |
42| Arena 0 +---+ | 4K |
43| 512G | +------------------+
44| | | |
45+---------------+ | |
46| | | |
47| Arena 1 | | Data Blocks |
48| 512G | | |
49| | | |
50+---------------+ | |
51| . | | |
52| . | | |
53| . | | |
54| | | |
55| | | |
56+---------------+ +------------------+
57 | |
58 | BTT Map |
59 | |
60 | |
61 +------------------+
62 | |
63 | BTT Flog |
64 | |
65 +------------------+
66 | Info block copy |
67 | 4K |
68 +------------------+
69
70
713. Theory of Operation
72----------------------
73
74
75a. The BTT Map
76--------------
77
78The map is a simple lookup/indirection table that maps an LBA to an internal
79block. Each map entry is 32 bits. The two most significant bits are special
80flags, and the remaining form the internal block number.
81
82Bit Description
Dan Williamsbc301962015-06-25 04:48:19 -04008331 - 30 : Error and Zero flags - Used in the following way:
84 Bit Description
85 31 30
86 -----------------------------------------------------------------------
87 00 Initial state. Reads return zeroes; Premap = Postmap
88 01 Zero state: Reads return zeroes
89 10 Error state: Reads fail; Writes clear 'E' bit
90 11 Normal Block – has valid postmap
91
92
9329 - 0 : Mappings to internal 'postmap' blocks
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -040094
95
96Some of the terminology that will be subsequently used:
97
98External LBA : LBA as made visible to upper layers.
99ABA : Arena Block Address - Block offset/number within an arena
100Premap ABA : The block offset into an arena, which was decided upon by range
101 checking the External LBA
102Postmap ABA : The block number in the "Data Blocks" area obtained after
103 indirection from the map
104nfree : The number of free blocks that are maintained at any given time.
105 This is the number of concurrent writes that can happen to the
106 arena.
107
108
109For example, after adding a BTT, we surface a disk of 1024G. We get a read for
110the external LBA at 768G. This falls into the second arena, and of the 512G
111worth of blocks that this arena contributes, this block is at 256G. Thus, the
112premap ABA is 256G. We now refer to the map, and find out the mapping for block
113'X' (256G) points to block 'Y', say '64'. Thus the postmap ABA is 64.
114
115
116b. The BTT Flog
117---------------
118
119The BTT provides sector atomicity by making every write an "allocating write",
120i.e. Every write goes to a "free" block. A running list of free blocks is
121maintained in the form of the BTT flog. 'Flog' is a combination of the words
122"free list" and "log". The flog contains 'nfree' entries, and an entry contains:
123
124lba : The premap ABA that is being written to
125old_map : The old postmap ABA - after 'this' write completes, this will be a
126 free block.
127new_map : The new postmap ABA. The map will up updated to reflect this
128 lba->postmap_aba mapping, but we log it here in case we have to
129 recover.
130seq : Sequence number to mark which of the 2 sections of this flog entry is
131 valid/newest. It cycles between 01->10->11->01 (binary) under normal
132 operation, with 00 indicating an uninitialized state.
133lba' : alternate lba entry
134old_map': alternate old postmap entry
135new_map': alternate new postmap entry
136seq' : alternate sequence number.
137
Dan Williamsbc301962015-06-25 04:48:19 -0400138Each of the above fields is 32-bit, making one entry 32 bytes. Entries are also
139padded to 64 bytes to avoid cache line sharing or aliasing. Flog updates are
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400140done such that for any entry being written, it:
141a. overwrites the 'old' section in the entry based on sequence numbers
Dan Williamsbc301962015-06-25 04:48:19 -0400142b. writes the 'new' section such that the sequence number is written last.
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400143
144
145c. The concept of lanes
146-----------------------
147
148While 'nfree' describes the number of concurrent IOs an arena can process
149concurrently, 'nlanes' is the number of IOs the BTT device as a whole can
150process.
151 nlanes = min(nfree, num_cpus)
152A lane number is obtained at the start of any IO, and is used for indexing into
Dan Williamsbc301962015-06-25 04:48:19 -0400153all the on-disk and in-memory data structures for the duration of the IO. If
154there are more CPUs than the max number of available lanes, than lanes are
155protected by spinlocks.
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400156
157
158d. In-memory data structure: Read Tracking Table (RTT)
159------------------------------------------------------
160
161Consider a case where we have two threads, one doing reads and the other,
162writes. We can hit a condition where the writer thread grabs a free block to do
163a new IO, but the (slow) reader thread is still reading from it. In other words,
164the reader consulted a map entry, and started reading the corresponding block. A
165writer started writing to the same external LBA, and finished the write updating
166the map for that external LBA to point to its new postmap ABA. At this point the
167internal, postmap block that the reader is (still) reading has been inserted
168into the list of free blocks. If another write comes in for the same LBA, it can
169grab this free block, and start writing to it, causing the reader to read
170incorrect data. To prevent this, we introduce the RTT.
171
172The RTT is a simple, per arena table with 'nfree' entries. Every reader inserts
173into rtt[lane_number], the postmap ABA it is reading, and clears it after the
174read is complete. Every writer thread, after grabbing a free block, checks the
175RTT for its presence. If the postmap free block is in the RTT, it waits till the
176reader clears the RTT entry, and only then starts writing to it.
177
178
179e. In-memory data structure: map locks
180--------------------------------------
181
182Consider a case where two writer threads are writing to the same LBA. There can
183be a race in the following sequence of steps:
184
185free[lane] = map[premap_aba]
186map[premap_aba] = postmap_aba
187
188Both threads can update their respective free[lane] with the same old, freed
189postmap_aba. This has made the layout inconsistent by losing a free entry, and
190at the same time, duplicating another free entry for two lanes.
191
192To solve this, we could have a single map lock (per arena) that has to be taken
193before performing the above sequence, but we feel that could be too contentious.
194Instead we use an array of (nfree) map_locks that is indexed by
195(premap_aba modulo nfree).
196
197
198f. Reconstruction from the Flog
199-------------------------------
200
201On startup, we analyze the BTT flog to create our list of free blocks. We walk
202through all the entries, and for each lane, of the set of two possible
203'sections', we always look at the most recent one only (based on the sequence
204number). The reconstruction rules/steps are simple:
205- Read map[log_entry.lba].
206- If log_entry.new matches the map entry, then log_entry.old is free.
207- If log_entry.new does not match the map entry, then log_entry.new is free.
208 (This case can only be caused by power-fails/unsafe shutdowns)
209
210
211g. Summarizing - Read and Write flows
212-------------------------------------
213
214Read:
215
2161. Convert external LBA to arena number + pre-map ABA
2172. Get a lane (and take lane_lock)
2183. Read map to get the entry for this pre-map ABA
2194. Enter post-map ABA into RTT[lane]
2205. If TRIM flag set in map, return zeroes, and end IO (go to step 8)
2216. If ERROR flag set in map, end IO with EIO (go to step 8)
2227. Read data from this block
2238. Remove post-map ABA entry from RTT[lane]
2249. Release lane (and lane_lock)
225
226Write:
227
2281. Convert external LBA to Arena number + pre-map ABA
2292. Get a lane (and take lane_lock)
2303. Use lane to index into in-memory free list and obtain a new block, next flog
231 index, next sequence number
2324. Scan the RTT to check if free block is present, and spin/wait if it is.
2335. Write data to this free block
2346. Read map to get the existing post-map ABA entry for this pre-map ABA
2357. Write flog entry: [premap_aba / old postmap_aba / new postmap_aba / seq_num]
2368. Write new post-map ABA into map.
2379. Write old post-map entry into the free list
23810. Calculate next sequence number and write into the free list entry
23911. Release lane (and lane_lock)
240
241
2424. Error Handling
243=================
244
245An arena would be in an error state if any of the metadata is corrupted
246irrecoverably, either due to a bug or a media error. The following conditions
247indicate an error:
248- Info block checksum does not match (and recovering from the copy also fails)
249- All internal available blocks are not uniquely and entirely addressed by the
250 sum of mapped blocks and free blocks (from the BTT flog).
251- Rebuilding free list from the flog reveals missing/duplicate/impossible
252 entries
253- A map entry is out of bounds
254
255If any of these error conditions are encountered, the arena is put into a read
256only state using a flag in the info block.
257
258
Vishal Verma0aefa052016-05-27 12:43:45 -06002595. Usage
260========
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400261
Vishal Verma0aefa052016-05-27 12:43:45 -0600262The BTT can be set up on any disk (namespace) exposed by the libnvdimm subsystem
263(pmem, or blk mode). The easiest way to set up such a namespace is using the
264'ndctl' utility [1]:
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400265
Vishal Verma0aefa052016-05-27 12:43:45 -0600266For example, the ndctl command line to setup a btt with a 4k sector size is:
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400267
Vishal Verma0aefa052016-05-27 12:43:45 -0600268 ndctl create-namespace -f -e namespace0.0 -m sector -l 4k
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400269
Vishal Verma0aefa052016-05-27 12:43:45 -0600270See ndctl create-namespace --help for more options.
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400271
Vishal Verma0aefa052016-05-27 12:43:45 -0600272[1]: https://github.com/pmem/ndctl
Vishal Verma5212e112015-06-25 04:20:32 -0400273