Re: [Qemu-devel] [PATCH v2 03/15] block: Add flag to avoid wasted work in bdrv_is_allocated()

[Eric Blake <eblake@redhat.com>]

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On 07/04/2017 02:06 AM, Fam Zheng wrote:
> On Mon, 07/03 17:14, Eric Blake wrote:
>> @@ -1717,6 +1718,10 @@ int64_t coroutine_fn bdrv_co_get_block_status_from_backing(BlockDriverState *bs,
>>   * Drivers not implementing the functionality are assumed to not support
>>   * backing files, hence all their sectors are reported as allocated.
>>   *
>> + * If 'allocation' is true, the caller only cares about allocation
>> + * status; this is a hint that a larger 'pnum' result is more
>> + * important than including BDRV_BLOCK_OFFSET_VALID in the return.
>> + *
> 
> This is slightly unintuitive. I would guess "allocation == false" means "I don't
> care about the allocation status" but it actually is "I don't care about the
> consecutiveness". The "only" semantics is missing in the parameter name.
> 
> Maybe rename it to "consecutive" and invert the logic?  I.e. "consecutive ==
> true" means BDRV_BLOCK_OFFSET_VALID is wanted.

Reasonable idea; other [shorter] names I've been toying with:
strict
mapping
precise

any of which, if true (set true by bdrv_get_block_status), means that I
care more about BDRV_BLOCK_OFFSET_VALID and validity for learning host
offsets, if false  it means I'm okay getting a larger *pnum even if it
extends over disjoint host offsets; or:

fast

which if true (set true by bdrv_is_allocated) means I want a larger
*pnum even if I have to sacrifice accuracy by omitting
BDRV_BLOCK_OFFSET_VALID, because I'm trying to reduce effort spent.

> 
> Sorry for bikeshedding.

Not a problem, I also had some double-takes in writing my own code
trying to remember which way I wanted the 'allocation' boolean to be
set, so coming up with a more intuitive name/default state in order to
help legibility is worth it.  Do any of my above suggestions sound better?

-- 
Eric Blake, Principal Software Engineer
Red Hat, Inc.           +1-919-301-3266
Virtualization:  qemu.org | libvirt.org


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