mm: add dirty_background_bytes and dirty_bytes sysctls

This change introduces two new sysctls to /proc/sys/vm:
dirty_background_bytes and dirty_bytes.

dirty_background_bytes is the counterpart to dirty_background_ratio and
dirty_bytes is the counterpart to dirty_ratio.

With growing memory capacities of individual machines, it's no longer
sufficient to specify dirty thresholds as a percentage of the amount of
dirtyable memory over the entire system.

dirty_background_bytes and dirty_bytes specify quantities of memory, in
bytes, that represent the dirty limits for the entire system.  If either
of these values is set, its value represents the amount of dirty memory
that is needed to commence either background or direct writeback.

When a `bytes' or `ratio' file is written, its counterpart becomes a
function of the written value.  For example, if dirty_bytes is written to
be 8096, 8K of memory is required to commence direct writeback.
dirty_ratio is then functionally equivalent to 8K / the amount of
dirtyable memory:

	dirtyable_memory = free pages + mapped pages + file cache

	dirty_background_bytes = dirty_background_ratio * dirtyable_memory
		-or-
	dirty_background_ratio = dirty_background_bytes / dirtyable_memory

		AND

	dirty_bytes = dirty_ratio * dirtyable_memory
		-or-
	dirty_ratio = dirty_bytes / dirtyable_memory

Only one of dirty_background_bytes and dirty_background_ratio may be
specified at a time, and only one of dirty_bytes and dirty_ratio may be
specified.  When one sysctl is written, the other appears as 0 when read.

The `bytes' files operate on a page size granularity since dirty limits
are compared with ZVC values, which are in page units.

Prior to this change, the minimum dirty_ratio was 5 as implemented by
get_dirty_limits() although /proc/sys/vm/dirty_ratio would show any user
written value between 0 and 100.  This restriction is maintained, but
dirty_bytes has a lower limit of only one page.

Also prior to this change, the dirty_background_ratio could not equal or
exceed dirty_ratio.  This restriction is maintained in addition to
restricting dirty_background_bytes.  If either background threshold equals
or exceeds that of the dirty threshold, it is implicitly set to half the
dirty threshold.

Acked-by: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org>
Cc: Dave Chinner <david@fromorbit.com>
Cc: Christoph Lameter <cl@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: David Rientjes <rientjes@google.com>
Cc: Andrea Righi <righi.andrea@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>

1 files changed, 11 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/include/linux/writeback.h b/include/linux/writeback.h
index 259e9ea58ca..bb28c975c1d 100644
--- a/include/linux/writeback.h
+++ b/include/linux/writeback.h
@@ -107,7 +107,9 @@ void throttle_vm_writeout(gfp_t gfp_mask);
 
 /* These are exported to sysctl. */
 extern int dirty_background_ratio;
+extern unsigned long dirty_background_bytes;
 extern int vm_dirty_ratio;
+extern unsigned long vm_dirty_bytes;
 extern int dirty_writeback_interval;
 extern int dirty_expire_interval;
 extern int vm_highmem_is_dirtyable;
@@ -116,9 +118,18 @@ extern int laptop_mode;
 
 extern unsigned long determine_dirtyable_memory(void);
 
+extern int dirty_background_ratio_handler(struct ctl_table *table, int write,
+		struct file *filp, void __user *buffer, size_t *lenp,
+		loff_t *ppos);
+extern int dirty_background_bytes_handler(struct ctl_table *table, int write,
+		struct file *filp, void __user *buffer, size_t *lenp,
+		loff_t *ppos);
 extern int dirty_ratio_handler(struct ctl_table *table, int write,
 		struct file *filp, void __user *buffer, size_t *lenp,
 		loff_t *ppos);
+extern int dirty_bytes_handler(struct ctl_table *table, int write,
+		struct file *filp, void __user *buffer, size_t *lenp,
+		loff_t *ppos);
 
 struct ctl_table;
 struct file;