This patch implements two new messages that can be sent to the thin
pool target allowing it to take a snapshot of the _metadata_. This,
read-only snapshot can be accessed by userland, concurrently with the
live target.
Only one metadata snapshot can be held at a time. The pool's status
line will give the block location for the current msnap.
Since version 0.1.5 of the userland thin provisioning tools, the
thin_dump program displays the msnap as follows:
thin_dump -m <msnap root> <metadata dev>
Available here: https://github.com/jthornber/thin-provisioning-tools
Now that userland can access the metadata we can do various things
that have traditionally been kernel side tasks:
i) Incremental backups.
By using metadata snapshots we can work out what blocks have
changed over time. Combined with data snapshots we can ensure
the data doesn't change while we back it up.
A short proof of concept script can be found here:
https://github.com/jthornber/thinp-test-suite/blob/master/incremental_backup_example.rb
ii) Migration of thin devices from one pool to another.
iii) Merging snapshots back into an external origin.
iv) Asyncronous replication.
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <ejt@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
For the files which are not themselves modular, we can change
them to include only the smaller export.h since all they are
doing is looking for EXPORT_SYMBOL.
Reported-by: Stephen Rothwell <sfr@canb.auug.org.au>
Signed-off-by: Paul Gortmaker <paul.gortmaker@windriver.com>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
The persistent-data library offers a re-usable framework for the storage
and management of on-disk metadata in device-mapper targets.
It's used by the thin-provisioning target in the next patch and in an
upcoming hierarchical storage target.
For further information, please read
Documentation/device-mapper/persistent-data.txt
Signed-off-by: Joe Thornber <thornber@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Mike Snitzer <snitzer@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Alasdair G Kergon <agk@redhat.com>
Joe Thornber