Re: rpc_xprt_debugfs_register() - atomic_inc_return() usage

[Trond Myklebust <trondmy@hammerspace.com>]

On Wed, 2021-01-20 at 16:52 -0700, Shuah Khan wrote:
> Hi Anna and Trond,
> 
> I came across the following while reviewing atomic_inc_return()
> usages
> that cast return value to unsigned
> 
> rpc_xprt_debugfs_register()'s atomic_inc_return() usage looks a bit
> odd.
> 
> - cur_id isn't initialized
> - id = (unsigned int)atomic_inc_return(&cur_id);
> 
> Please note that id is int. Is it expected that cur_id could
> overflow?
> Is there a maximum limit for this value?
> 

Yes, we do expect cur_id to eventually overflow (once you have created
2 billion RPC client instances), however the atomic increment
operations are expected to handle this correctly according to the
maintainers (I already asked them in a different context). Furthermore,
the code itself doesn't care about strict sequentiality. All it wants
from the counter is uniqueness, with that uniqueness condition actually
being enforced by the subsequent debugfs_create_file() call.

IOW: I don't think this is a real problem.

-- 
Trond Myklebust
Linux NFS client maintainer, Hammerspace
trond.myklebust@hammerspace.com