Re: [PATCH RFC 1/3] block: Add support for REQ_OP_ASSIGN_RANGE operation

[Martin K. Petersen]

Kirill,

Sorry, the holiday break got in the way.

> But I also worry about NOFALLBACK case. There are possible block
> devices, which support write zeroes, but they can't allocate blocks
> (block allocation are just not appliable for them, say, these are all
> ordinary hdd).

Correct. We shouldn't go down this path unless a device is thinly
provisioned (i.e. max_discard_sectors > 0).

> But won't it be a good thing to return EOPNOTSUPP right from
> __blkdev_issue_write_zeroes() in case of block device can't allocate
> blocks (q->limits.write_zeroes_can_allocate in the patch below)? Here
> is just a way to underline block devices, which support write zeroes,
> but allocation of blocks is meant nothing for them (wasting of time).

I don't like "write_zeroes_can_allocate" because that makes assumptions
about WRITE ZEROES being the command of choice. I suggest we call it
"max_allocate_sectors" to mirror "max_discard_sectors". I.e. put
emphasis on the semantic operation and not the plumbing.

-- 
Martin K. Petersen	Oracle Linux Engineering