[PATCH] flush_work_queue() fixes

The workqueue code currently has a notion of a per-cpu queue being "busy".
flush_scheduled_work()'s responsibility is to wait for a queue to be not busy.

Problem is, flush_scheduled_work() can easily hang up.

- The workqueue is deemed "busy" when there are pending delayed
  (timer-based) works.  But if someone repeatedly schedules new delayed work
  in the callback, the queue will never fall idle, and flush_scheduled_work()
  will not terminate.

- If someone reschedules work (not delayed work) in the work function, that
  too will cause the queue to never go idle, and flush_scheduled_work() will
  not terminate.

So what this patch does is:

- Create a new "cancel_delayed_work()" which will try to kill off any
  timer-based delayed works.

- Change flush_scheduled_work() so that it is immune to people re-adding
  work in the work callout handler.

  We can do this by recognising that the caller does *not* want to wait
  until the workqueue is "empty".  The caller merely wants to wait until all
  works which were pending at the time flush_scheduled_work() was called have
  completed.

  The patch uses a couple of sequence numbers for that.

So now, if someone wants to reliably remove delayed work they should do:


	/*
	 * Make sure that my work-callback will no longer schedule new work
	 */
	my_driver_is_shutting_down = 1;

	/*
	 * Kill off any pending delayed work
	 */
	cancel_delayed_work(&my_work);

	/*
	 * OK, there will be no new works scheduled.  But there may be one
	 * currently queued or in progress.  So wait for that to complete.
	 */
	flush_scheduled_work();


The patch also changes the flush_workqueue() sleep to be uninterruptible.
We cannot legally bale out if a signal is delivered anyway.

1 files changed, 10 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/include/linux/workqueue.h b/include/linux/workqueue.h
index 47b1414738ec..096bca54cc77 100644
--- a/include/linux/workqueue.h
+++ b/include/linux/workqueue.h
@@ -63,5 +63,15 @@ extern int current_is_keventd(void);
 
 extern void init_workqueues(void);
 
+/*
+ * Kill off a pending schedule_delayed_work().  Note that the work callback
+ * function may still be running on return from cancel_delayed_work().  Run
+ * flush_scheduled_work() to wait on it.
+ */
+static inline int cancel_delayed_work(struct work_struct *work)
+{
+	return del_timer_sync(&work->timer);
+}
+
 #endif