ID Allocation¶
- Author:
Matthew Wilcox
Overview¶
A common problem to solve is allocating identifiers (IDs); generally small numbers which identify a thing. Examples include file descriptors, process IDs, packet identifiers in networking protocols, SCSI tags and device instance numbers. The IDR and the IDA provide a reasonable solution to the problem to avoid everybody inventing their own. The IDR provides the ability to map an ID to a pointer, while the IDA provides only ID allocation, and as a result is much more memory-efficient.
The IDR interface is deprecated; please use the XArray instead.
IDR usage¶
Start by initialising an IDR, either with DEFINE_IDR()
for statically allocated IDRs or idr_init()
for dynamically
allocated IDRs.
You can call idr_alloc()
to allocate an unused ID. Look up
the pointer you associated with the ID by calling idr_find()
and free the ID by calling idr_remove()
.
If you need to change the pointer associated with an ID, you can call
idr_replace()
. One common reason to do this is to reserve an
ID by passing a NULL
pointer to the allocation function; initialise the
object with the reserved ID and finally insert the initialised object
into the IDR.
Some users need to allocate IDs larger than INT_MAX
. So far all of
these users have been content with a UINT_MAX
limit, and they use
idr_alloc_u32()
. If you need IDs that will not fit in a u32,
we will work with you to address your needs.
If you need to allocate IDs sequentially, you can use
idr_alloc_cyclic()
. The IDR becomes less efficient when dealing
with larger IDs, so using this function comes at a slight cost.
To perform an action on all pointers used by the IDR, you can
either use the callback-based idr_for_each()
or the
iterator-style idr_for_each_entry()
. You may need to use
idr_for_each_entry_continue()
to continue an iteration. You can
also use idr_get_next()
if the iterator doesn't fit your needs.
When you have finished using an IDR, you can call idr_destroy() to release the memory used by the IDR. This will not free the objects pointed to from the IDR; if you want to do that, use one of the iterators to do it.
You can use idr_is_empty()
to find out whether there are any
IDs currently allocated.
If you need to take a lock while allocating a new ID from the IDR,
you may need to pass a restrictive set of GFP flags, which can lead
to the IDR being unable to allocate memory. To work around this,
you can call idr_preload() before taking the lock, and then
idr_preload_end()
after the allocation.
idr synchronization (stolen from radix-tree.h)
idr_find()
is able to be called locklessly, using RCU. The caller must
ensure calls to this function are made within rcu_read_lock()
regions.
Other readers (lock-free or otherwise) and modifications may be running
concurrently.
It is still required that the caller manage the synchronization and
lifetimes of the items. So if RCU lock-free lookups are used, typically
this would mean that the items have their own locks, or are amenable to
lock-free access; and that the items are freed by RCU (or only freed after
having been deleted from the idr tree and a synchronize_rcu()
grace
period).
IDA usage¶
The IDA is an ID allocator which does not provide the ability to
associate an ID with a pointer. As such, it only needs to store one
bit per ID, and so is more space efficient than an IDR. To use an IDA,
define it using DEFINE_IDA() (or embed a struct ida
in a data structure,
then initialise it using ida_init()). To allocate a new ID, call
ida_alloc()
, ida_alloc_min()
, ida_alloc_max()
or ida_alloc_range()
.
To free an ID, call ida_free()
.
ida_destroy()
can be used to dispose of an IDA without needing to
free the individual IDs in it. You can use ida_is_empty() to find
out whether the IDA has any IDs currently allocated.
The IDA handles its own locking. It is safe to call any of the IDA functions without synchronisation in your code.
IDs are currently limited to the range [0-INT_MAX]. If this is an awkward limitation, it should be quite straightforward to raise the maximum.
Functions and structures¶
-
IDR_INIT¶
IDR_INIT (name)
Initialise an IDR.
Parameters
name
Name of IDR.
Description
A freshly-initialised IDR contains no IDs.
-
DEFINE_IDR¶
DEFINE_IDR (name)
Define a statically-allocated IDR.
Parameters
name
Name of IDR.
Description
An IDR defined using this macro is ready for use with no additional initialisation required. It contains no IDs.
-
unsigned int idr_get_cursor(const struct idr *idr)¶
Return the current position of the cyclic allocator
Parameters
const struct idr *idr
idr handle
Description
The value returned is the value that will be next returned from
idr_alloc_cyclic()
if it is free (otherwise the search will start from
this position).
-
void idr_set_cursor(struct idr *idr, unsigned int val)¶
Set the current position of the cyclic allocator
Parameters
struct idr *idr
idr handle
unsigned int val
new position
Description
The next call to idr_alloc_cyclic()
will return val if it is free
(otherwise the search will start from this position).
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
int base
The base value for the IDR.
Description
This variation of idr_init()
creates an IDR which will allocate IDs
starting at base
.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
Description
Initialise a dynamically allocated IDR. To initialise a
statically allocated IDR, use DEFINE_IDR()
.
Parameters
const struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
Return
true
if any IDs have been allocated from this IDR.
-
void idr_preload_end(void)¶
end preload section started with idr_preload()
Parameters
void
no arguments
Description
Each idr_preload() should be matched with an invocation of this function. See idr_preload() for details.
-
idr_for_each_entry¶
idr_for_each_entry (idr, entry, id)
Iterate over an IDR's elements of a given type.
Parameters
idr
IDR handle.
entry
The type * to use as cursor
id
Entry ID.
Description
entry and id do not need to be initialized before the loop, and after normal termination entry is left with the value NULL. This is convenient for a "not found" value.
-
idr_for_each_entry_ul¶
idr_for_each_entry_ul (idr, entry, tmp, id)
Iterate over an IDR's elements of a given type.
Parameters
idr
IDR handle.
entry
The type * to use as cursor.
tmp
A temporary placeholder for ID.
id
Entry ID.
Description
entry and id do not need to be initialized before the loop, and after normal termination entry is left with the value NULL. This is convenient for a "not found" value.
-
idr_for_each_entry_continue¶
idr_for_each_entry_continue (idr, entry, id)
Continue iteration over an IDR's elements of a given type
Parameters
idr
IDR handle.
entry
The type * to use as a cursor.
id
Entry ID.
Description
Continue to iterate over entries, continuing after the current position.
-
idr_for_each_entry_continue_ul¶
idr_for_each_entry_continue_ul (idr, entry, tmp, id)
Continue iteration over an IDR's elements of a given type
Parameters
idr
IDR handle.
entry
The type * to use as a cursor.
tmp
A temporary placeholder for ID.
id
Entry ID.
Description
Continue to iterate over entries, continuing after the current position. After normal termination entry is left with the value NULL. This is convenient for a "not found" value.
Parameters
struct ida *ida
IDA handle.
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocate an ID between 0 and INT_MAX
, inclusive.
Context
Any context. It is safe to call this function without locking in your code.
Return
The allocated ID, or -ENOMEM
if memory could not be allocated,
or -ENOSPC
if there are no free IDs.
Parameters
struct ida *ida
IDA handle.
unsigned int min
Lowest ID to allocate.
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocate an ID between min and INT_MAX
, inclusive.
Context
Any context. It is safe to call this function without locking in your code.
Return
The allocated ID, or -ENOMEM
if memory could not be allocated,
or -ENOSPC
if there are no free IDs.
Parameters
struct ida *ida
IDA handle.
unsigned int max
Highest ID to allocate.
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocate an ID between 0 and max, inclusive.
Context
Any context. It is safe to call this function without locking in your code.
Return
The allocated ID, or -ENOMEM
if memory could not be allocated,
or -ENOSPC
if there are no free IDs.
-
int idr_alloc_u32(struct idr *idr, void *ptr, u32 *nextid, unsigned long max, gfp_t gfp)¶
Allocate an ID.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
void *ptr
Pointer to be associated with the new ID.
u32 *nextid
Pointer to an ID.
unsigned long max
The maximum ID to allocate (inclusive).
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocates an unused ID in the range specified by nextid and max.
Note that max is inclusive whereas the end parameter to idr_alloc()
is exclusive. The new ID is assigned to nextid before the pointer
is inserted into the IDR, so if nextid points into the object pointed
to by ptr, a concurrent lookup will not find an uninitialised ID.
The caller should provide their own locking to ensure that two concurrent modifications to the IDR are not possible. Read-only accesses to the IDR may be done under the RCU read lock or may exclude simultaneous writers.
Return
0 if an ID was allocated, -ENOMEM if memory allocation failed, or -ENOSPC if no free IDs could be found. If an error occurred, nextid is unchanged.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
void *ptr
Pointer to be associated with the new ID.
int start
The minimum ID (inclusive).
int end
The maximum ID (exclusive).
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocates an unused ID in the range specified by start and end. If
end is <= 0, it is treated as one larger than INT_MAX
. This allows
callers to use start + N as end as long as N is within integer range.
The caller should provide their own locking to ensure that two concurrent modifications to the IDR are not possible. Read-only accesses to the IDR may be done under the RCU read lock or may exclude simultaneous writers.
Return
The newly allocated ID, -ENOMEM if memory allocation failed, or -ENOSPC if no free IDs could be found.
-
int idr_alloc_cyclic(struct idr *idr, void *ptr, int start, int end, gfp_t gfp)¶
Allocate an ID cyclically.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
void *ptr
Pointer to be associated with the new ID.
int start
The minimum ID (inclusive).
int end
The maximum ID (exclusive).
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocates an unused ID in the range specified by start and end. If
end is <= 0, it is treated as one larger than INT_MAX
. This allows
callers to use start + N as end as long as N is within integer range.
The search for an unused ID will start at the last ID allocated and will
wrap around to start if no free IDs are found before reaching end.
The caller should provide their own locking to ensure that two concurrent modifications to the IDR are not possible. Read-only accesses to the IDR may be done under the RCU read lock or may exclude simultaneous writers.
Return
The newly allocated ID, -ENOMEM if memory allocation failed, or -ENOSPC if no free IDs could be found.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
unsigned long id
Pointer ID.
Description
Removes this ID from the IDR. If the ID was not previously in the IDR,
this function returns NULL
.
Since this function modifies the IDR, the caller should provide their own locking to ensure that concurrent modification of the same IDR is not possible.
Return
The pointer formerly associated with this ID.
Parameters
const struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
unsigned long id
Pointer ID.
Description
Looks up the pointer associated with this ID. A NULL
pointer may
indicate that id is not allocated or that the NULL
pointer was
associated with this ID.
This function can be called under rcu_read_lock()
, given that the leaf
pointers lifetimes are correctly managed.
Return
The pointer associated with this ID.
-
int idr_for_each(const struct idr *idr, int (*fn)(int id, void *p, void *data), void *data)¶
Iterate through all stored pointers.
Parameters
const struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
int (*fn)(int id, void *p, void *data)
Function to be called for each pointer.
void *data
Data passed to callback function.
Description
The callback function will be called for each entry in idr, passing the ID, the entry and data.
If fn returns anything other than 0
, the iteration stops and that
value is returned from this function.
idr_for_each()
can be called concurrently with idr_alloc()
and
idr_remove()
if protected by RCU. Newly added entries may not be
seen and deleted entries may be seen, but adding and removing entries
will not cause other entries to be skipped, nor spurious ones to be seen.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
unsigned long *nextid
Pointer to an ID.
Description
Returns the next populated entry in the tree with an ID greater than or equal to the value pointed to by nextid. On exit, nextid is updated to the ID of the found value. To use in a loop, the value pointed to by nextid must be incremented by the user.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
int *nextid
Pointer to an ID.
Description
Returns the next populated entry in the tree with an ID greater than or equal to the value pointed to by nextid. On exit, nextid is updated to the ID of the found value. To use in a loop, the value pointed to by nextid must be incremented by the user.
Parameters
struct idr *idr
IDR handle.
void *ptr
New pointer to associate with the ID.
unsigned long id
ID to change.
Description
Replace the pointer registered with an ID and return the old value.
This function can be called under the RCU read lock concurrently with
idr_alloc()
and idr_remove()
(as long as the ID being removed is not
the one being replaced!).
Return
the old value on success. -ENOENT
indicates that id was not
found. -EINVAL
indicates that ptr was not valid.
-
int ida_alloc_range(struct ida *ida, unsigned int min, unsigned int max, gfp_t gfp)¶
Allocate an unused ID.
Parameters
struct ida *ida
IDA handle.
unsigned int min
Lowest ID to allocate.
unsigned int max
Highest ID to allocate.
gfp_t gfp
Memory allocation flags.
Description
Allocate an ID between min and max, inclusive. The allocated ID will
not exceed INT_MAX
, even if max is larger.
Context
Any context. It is safe to call this function without locking in your code.
Return
The allocated ID, or -ENOMEM
if memory could not be allocated,
or -ENOSPC
if there are no free IDs.
Parameters
struct ida *ida
IDA handle.
unsigned int id
Previously allocated ID.
Context
Any context. It is safe to call this function without locking in your code.
Parameters
struct ida *ida
IDA handle.
Description
Calling this function frees all IDs and releases all resources used by an IDA. When this call returns, the IDA is empty and can be reused or freed. If the IDA is already empty, there is no need to call this function.
Context
Any context. It is safe to call this function without locking in your code.