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Re: Buffer locking is special (hints, checksums, AIO writes)

Andres Freund <andres@anarazel.de>

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From: Andres Freund <andres@anarazel.de>
To: Yura Sokolov <y.sokolov@postgrespro.ru>
Cc: Melanie Plageman <melanieplageman@gmail.com>, Noah Misch <noah@leadboat.com>, Heikki Linnakangas <hlinnaka@iki.fi>, Kirill Reshke <reshkekirill@gmail.com>, Matthias van de Meent <boekewurm+postgres@gmail.com>, pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org, Thomas Munro <thomas.munro@gmail.com>, Robert Haas <robertmhaas@gmail.com>, Michael Paquier <michael.paquier@gmail.com>
Date: 2026-04-01T00:29:02Z
Lists: pgsql-hackers 
Hi,

On 2026-03-31 18:05:46 -0400, Andres Freund wrote:
> On 2026-03-31 19:02:33 +0300, Yura Sokolov wrote:
> > 27.03.2026 23:00, Andres Freund wrote:
> > > On 2026-03-25 18:35:55 -0400, Andres Freund wrote:
> > >> Running it through valgrind and then will work on reading through one more
> > >> time and pushing them.
> > >
> > > And done.
> > >
> > > Phew, this project took way longer than I'd though it'd take.
> >
> > In addition to bug with BM_IO_ERROR [1] , I found race condition in
> > PinBuffer in this lines of code:
> >
> > 	if (unlikely(skip_if_not_valid && !(old_buf_state & BM_VALID)))
> > 		return false;
> >
> > 	/*
> > 	 * We're not allowed to increase the refcount while the buffer
> > 	 * header spinlock is held. Wait for the lock to be released.
> > 	 */
> > 	if (old_buf_state & BM_LOCKED)
> > 		old_buf_state = WaitBufHdrUnlocked(buf);
> >
> > While we waited for buffer header for being unlocked, it may become
> > invalid, isn't it?
> > Therefore, check related to skip_if_not_valid have to happen after waiting.
>
> Yea, that does seem wrong.  Not sure how it ended up that way.
>
> I think it may be better to add a continue after the WaitBufHdrUnlocked(), so
> that we restart the loop, rather than moving the skip_if_not_valid check.

Done that way. Thanks for finding & reporting this, well spotted!

Greetings,

Andres

Commits

Same data as JSON: GET /api/v1/messages/:b64id/commits the thread's linked commits as JSON, with link sources. API reference →

  1. bufmgr: Fix ordering of checks in PinBuffer()

  2. Use UnlockReleaseBuffer() in more places

  3. bufmgr: Make UnlockReleaseBuffer() more efficient

  4. bufmgr: Don't copy pages while writing out

  5. Fix use of wrong variable in _hash_kill_items()

  6. Fix bug due to confusion about what IsMVCCSnapshot means

  7. bufmgr: Switch to standard order in MarkBufferDirtyHint()

  8. bufmgr: Remove the, now obsolete, BM_JUST_DIRTIED

  9. Require share-exclusive lock to set hint bits and to flush

  10. heapam: Don't mimic MarkBufferDirtyHint() in inplace updates

  11. bufmgr: Allow conditionally locking of already locked buffer

  12. bufmgr: Avoid spurious compiler warning after fcb9c977aa5

  13. lwlock: Remove ForEachLWLockHeldByMe

  14. lwlock: Remove support for disowned lwlwocks

  15. bufmgr: Implement buffer content locks independently of lwlocks

  16. bufmgr: Change BufferDesc.state to be a 64-bit atomic

  17. lwlock: Improve local variable name

  18. lwlock: Invert meaning of LW_FLAG_RELEASE_OK

  19. bufmgr: Make definitions related to buffer descriptor easier to modify

  20. heapam: Add batch mode mvcc check and use it in page mode

  21. freespace: Don't modify page without any lock

  22. heapam: Move logic to handle HEAP_MOVED into a helper function

  23. bufmgr: Optimize & harmonize LockBufHdr(), LWLockWaitListLock()

  24. bufmgr: Add one-entry cache for private refcount

  25. bufmgr: Separate keys for private refcount infrastructure

  26. Add pg_atomic_unlocked_write_u64

  27. Rename BUFFERPIN wait event class to BUFFER

  28. bufmgr: Turn BUFFER_LOCK_* into an enum

  29. lwlock: Fix, currently harmless, bug in LWLockWakeup()

  30. bufmgr: Use atomic sub for unpinning buffers

  31. bufmgr: Allow some buffer state modifications while holding header lock

  32. bufmgr: Fix valgrind checking for buffers pinned in StrategyGetBuffer()

  33. bufmgr: Don't lock buffer header in StrategyGetBuffer()

  34. bufmgr: fewer calls to BufferDescriptorGetContentLock

  35. bufmgr: Fix signedness of mask variable in BufferSync()

  36. bufmgr: Introduce FlushUnlockedBuffer

  37. Improve ReadRecentBuffer() scalability