[libvirt] [PATCH 1/2] Storage: Suppress metadata refresh for volumes being built.

[Prerna Saxena]

On Tuesday 05 May 2015 01:52 PM, Ján Tomko wrote:
> On Tue, May 05, 2015 at 08:43:21AM +0530, Prerna Saxena wrote:
>> Libvirt periodically calls 'stat' on all volumes in a storage pool,
>> to update fields such as 'target.allocation'.
>>
>> The operation doesnt make sense for a volume which is curently being allocated.
> From the comments in the storage driver, the point of allowing refresh
> for a volume that is currently being allocated is to track the progress
> of the allocation.
>
>> Also, the 'target.allocation' sub-field is taken into account while copying a raw image.
>> To suppress any (potential) corruption, libvirt must not attempt to refresh a volume currently being built.
> What would be the corruption?
>
> We do not allow using a volume that is currently building as a
> source for cloning the volume - storageVolCreateXMLFrom checks for
> origvol->building:
>
>     if (origvol->building) {
>         virReportError(VIR_ERR_OPERATION_INVALID,
>                        _("volume '%s' is still being allocated."),
>                        origvol->name);
>         goto cleanup;
>     }
>

While running libvirt on PowerPC, I saw an interesting scenario. The 'target.allocation' field seemed to change for a volume getting allocated, and this would lead to incomplete copy. This would
happen at random intervals, not deterministically. While looking through the code, I found this to be the other place in code where the same field seemed to change without a lock. Hence the patch.

I have sent the second patch which fixes the erring code too :

-    remain = vol->target.allocation;
+    remain = inputvol->target.capacity;



Regards,

-- 
Prerna Saxena

Linux Technology Centre,
IBM Systems and Technology Lab,
Bangalore, India