block: update documentation for REQ_FLUSH / REQ_FUA

Signed-off-by: Christoph Hellwig <hch@lst.de>
Signed-off-by: Tejun Heo <tj@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Jens Axboe <jaxboe@fusionio.com>

1 files changed, 86 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/block/writeback_cache_control.txt b/Documentation/block/writeback_cache_control.txt
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+
+Explicit volatile write back cache control
+=====================================
+
+Introduction
+------------
+
+Many storage devices, especially in the consumer market, come with volatile
+write back caches.  That means the devices signal I/O completion to the
+operating system before data actually has hit the non-volatile storage.  This
+behavior obviously speeds up various workloads, but it means the operating
+system needs to force data out to the non-volatile storage when it performs
+a data integrity operation like fsync, sync or an unmount.
+
+The Linux block layer provides two simple mechanisms that let filesystems
+control the caching behavior of the storage device.  These mechanisms are
+a forced cache flush, and the Force Unit Access (FUA) flag for requests.
+
+
+Explicit cache flushes
+----------------------
+
+The REQ_FLUSH flag can be OR ed into the r/w flags of a bio submitted from
+the filesystem and will make sure the volatile cache of the storage device
+has been flushed before the actual I/O operation is started.  This explicitly
+guarantees that previously completed write requests are on non-volatile
+storage before the flagged bio starts. In addition the REQ_FLUSH flag can be
+set on an otherwise empty bio structure, which causes only an explicit cache
+flush without any dependent I/O.  It is recommend to use
+the blkdev_issue_flush() helper for a pure cache flush.
+
+
+Forced Unit Access
+-----------------
+
+The REQ_FUA flag can be OR ed into the r/w flags of a bio submitted from the
+filesystem and will make sure that I/O completion for this request is only
+signaled after the data has been committed to non-volatile storage.
+
+
+Implementation details for filesystems
+--------------------------------------
+
+Filesystems can simply set the REQ_FLUSH and REQ_FUA bits and do not have to
+worry if the underlying devices need any explicit cache flushing and how
+the Forced Unit Access is implemented.  The REQ_FLUSH and REQ_FUA flags
+may both be set on a single bio.
+
+
+Implementation details for make_request_fn based block drivers
+--------------------------------------------------------------
+
+These drivers will always see the REQ_FLUSH and REQ_FUA bits as they sit
+directly below the submit_bio interface.  For remapping drivers the REQ_FUA
+bits need to be propagated to underlying devices, and a global flush needs
+to be implemented for bios with the REQ_FLUSH bit set.  For real device
+drivers that do not have a volatile cache the REQ_FLUSH and REQ_FUA bits
+on non-empty bios can simply be ignored, and REQ_FLUSH requests without
+data can be completed successfully without doing any work.  Drivers for
+devices with volatile caches need to implement the support for these
+flags themselves without any help from the block layer.
+
+
+Implementation details for request_fn based block drivers
+--------------------------------------------------------------
+
+For devices that do not support volatile write caches there is no driver
+support required, the block layer completes empty REQ_FLUSH requests before
+entering the driver and strips off the REQ_FLUSH and REQ_FUA bits from
+requests that have a payload.  For devices with volatile write caches the
+driver needs to tell the block layer that it supports flushing caches by
+doing:
+
+	blk_queue_flush(sdkp->disk->queue, REQ_FLUSH);
+
+and handle empty REQ_FLUSH requests in its prep_fn/request_fn.  Note that
+REQ_FLUSH requests with a payload are automatically turned into a sequence
+of an empty REQ_FLUSH request followed by the actual write by the block
+layer.  For devices that also support the FUA bit the block layer needs
+to be told to pass through the REQ_FUA bit using:
+
+	blk_queue_flush(sdkp->disk->queue, REQ_FLUSH | REQ_FUA);
+
+and the driver must handle write requests that have the REQ_FUA bit set
+in prep_fn/request_fn.  If the FUA bit is not natively supported the block
+layer turns it into an empty REQ_FLUSH request after the actual write.