Coda File System

Re: inode aliases

From: Bruce Janson <bruce_at_staff.cs.usyd.edu.au>
Date: Tue, 07 Jul 1998 23:54:36 +1000
    ..
    Date: Tue, 7 Jul 1998 09:27:28 -0400 (EDT)
    From: "Peter J. Braam" <braam_at_cs.cmu.edu>
    ..
    To: linux-coda_at_TELEMANN.CODA.CS.CMU.EDU
    ..
    Yes it is Coda and it is bad: this is one of the remaining kernel bugs
    that we are trying to track down.  These alias messages lead to wild
    pointers, since dentry's continue to exist, but the inodes they point to
    are being freed. 
    
    If anyone can easily produce alias messages, I'd love to know how to nail
    the bug!
    ..

Hi Peter,
    I have had some success with the following script:

	$ cat aliases
	#!/bin/sh

	>/tmp/a

	while :
	do
		ln /tmp/a /tmp/b
		rm /tmp/b
	done
	$ 

Here, /tmp is a file system which uses the Linux Coda kernel 
interface (Linux 2.1.107, Coda 4.6.0).
The above script usually produces an `alias' message
immediately, followed by a cascade of random errors.

Hope it crashes your filesystem too (and I mean that in the
nicest possible way).

Regards,
bruce.
Received on 1998-07-07 10:05:46