Locking Data Structures in MadWifi

This page will collect all information about locking procedures in madwifi. The idea is to document which lock protects what data structure, under what context, in what function and why. That way, all the devs will have a consistent view of what lock behaviors to change when needed. Also, we have to define a pecking order for the locks so we won't have live locks. We should also make sure the locks are unlocked in LIFO order so we don't have weird messes.

ath

struct ath_node - spinlock_t an_uapsd_lock

ATH_NODE_UAPSD_LOCK_IRQ/ATH_NODE_UAPSD_UNLOCK_IRQ/ATH_NODE_UAPSD_UNLOCK_IRQ_EARLY

struct ath_softc - struct semaphore sc_lock

ATH_LOCK/ATH_UNLOCK

struct ath_txq - spinlock_t axq_lock

Locks everything of ath_txq

ATH_TXQ_LOCK_IRQ/ATH_TXQ_UNLOCK_IRQ/ATH_TXQ_UNLOCK_IRQ_EARLY/ATH_TXQ_LOCK_IRQ_INSDE/ATH_TXQ_UNLOCK_IRQ_INSIDE

ath_uapsd_processtriggers() - locks uapsd_xmit_q ath_tx_txqaddbuf() ath_ff_stageq_flush() ath_hardstart() ath_beacon_generate() - locks sc->sc_cabq and avp->av_mcastq ath_node_move_data() ath_grppoll_start() ath_tx_processq() ath_tx_draintxq()

Queues include ath_vap's av_mcastq, softc's sc_txq[HAL_NUM_TX_QUEUES], sc_ac2q[WME_NUM_AC], sc_cabq, sc_grpplq, sc_xrtxq, sc_uapsdq

-- struct ath_node an_tx_ffbuf ??

struct ath_softc - spinlock_t sc_rxbuflock

ATH_RXBUF_LOCK_IRQ/ATH_RXBUF_UNLOCK_IRQ/ATH_RXBUF_UNLOCK_EARLY

Protection for sc->sc_rxbufcur, sc_rxbuf, sc_rxlink(?)

struct ath_softc - spinlock_t sc_txbuflock

ATH_TXBUF_LOCK_IRQ/ATH_TXBUF_UNLOCK_IRQ/ATH_TXBUF_UNLOCK_EARLY

Protection for sc->sc_txbuf

struct ath_softc - spinlock_t sc_hal_lock

All accesses to the HAL needs to hold this lock. Check ath/if_ath_hal.h for function list.

net80211

http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/rusty/kernel-locking/index.html