[PATCH] Warn about flush_scheduled_work()

From: Alan Stern
Date: Wed Dec 16 2009 - 10:52:29 EST


This patch (as1319) adds kerneldoc and a pointed warning to
flush_scheduled_work().

Signed-off-by: Alan Stern <stern@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

---

Index: usb-2.6/kernel/workqueue.c
===================================================================
--- usb-2.6.orig/kernel/workqueue.c
+++ usb-2.6/kernel/workqueue.c
@@ -720,6 +720,30 @@ int schedule_on_each_cpu(work_func_t fun
return 0;
}

+/**
+ * flush_scheduled_work - ensure that any scheduled work has run to completion.
+ *
+ * Forces execution of the kernel-global workqueue and blocks until its
+ * completion.
+ *
+ * Think twice before calling this function! It's very easy to get into
+ * trouble if you don't take great care. Either of the following situations
+ * will lead to deadlock:
+ *
+ * One of the work items currently on the workqueue needs to acquire
+ * a lock held by your code or its caller.
+ *
+ * Your code is running in the context of a work routine.
+ *
+ * They will be detected by lockdep when they occur, but the first might not
+ * occur very often. It depends on what work items are on the workqueue and
+ * what locks they need, which you have no control over.
+ *
+ * In most situations flushing the entire workqueue is overkill; you merely
+ * need to know that a particular work item isn't queued and isn't running.
+ * In such cases you should use cancel_delayed_work_sync() or
+ * cancel_work_sync() instead.
+ */
void flush_scheduled_work(void)
{
flush_workqueue(keventd_wq);

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