Re: [PATCH] mm: always respect QUEUE_FLAG_STABLE_WRITES on the block device

[Matthew Wilcox]

On Thu, May 04, 2023 at 05:55:56PM +0200, Jan Kara wrote:
> For bdev address_space that's easy but what Ilya also mentioned is a
> problem when 'stable_write' flag gets toggled on the device and in that
> case having to propagate the flag update to all the address_space
> structures is a nightmare...

We have a number of flags which don't take effect when modified on a
block device with a mounted filesystem on it.  For example, modifying
the readahead settings do not change existing files, only new ones.
Since this flag is only modifiable for debugging purposes, I think I'm
OK with it not affecting already-mounted filesystems.  It feels like a
decision that reasonable people could disagree on, though.