@@ -39,7 +39,7 @@ objects in the original filesystem.
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On 64bit systems, even if all overlay layers are not on the same
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underlying filesystem, the same compliant behavior could be achieved
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with the "xino" feature. The "xino" feature composes a unique object
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- identifier from the real object st_ino and an underlying fsid index .
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+ identifier from the real object st_ino and an underlying fsid number .
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The "xino" feature uses the high inode number bits for fsid, because the
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underlying filesystems rarely use the high inode number bits. In case
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the underlying inode number does overflow into the high xino bits, overlay
@@ -118,7 +118,7 @@ Where both upper and lower objects are directories, a merged directory
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is formed.
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At mount time, the two directories given as mount options "lowerdir" and
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- "upperdir" are combined into a merged directory:
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+ "upperdir" are combined into a merged directory::
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mount -t overlay overlay -olowerdir=/lower,upperdir=/upper,\
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workdir=/work /merged
@@ -172,12 +172,12 @@ directory is being read. This is unlikely to be noticed by many
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programs.
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seek offsets are assigned sequentially when the directories are read.
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- Thus if
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+ Thus if:
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- - read part of a directory
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- - remember an offset, and close the directory
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- - re-open the directory some time later
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- - seek to the remembered offset
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+ - read part of a directory
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+ - remember an offset, and close the directory
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+ - re-open the directory some time later
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+ - seek to the remembered offset
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there may be little correlation between the old and new locations in
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the list of filenames, particularly if anything has changed in the
@@ -290,9 +290,9 @@ Permission checking in the overlay filesystem follows these principles:
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2) task creating the overlay mount MUST NOT gain additional privileges
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3) non-mounting task MAY gain additional privileges through the overlay,
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- compared to direct access on underlying lower or upper filesystems
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+ compared to direct access on underlying lower or upper filesystems
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- This is achieved by performing two permission checks on each access
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+ This is achieved by performing two permission checks on each access:
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a) check if current task is allowed access based on local DAC (owner,
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group, mode and posix acl), as well as MAC checks
@@ -311,11 +311,11 @@ to create setups where the consistency rule (1) does not hold; normally,
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however, the mounting task will have sufficient privileges to perform all
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operations.
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- Another way to demonstrate this model is drawing parallels between
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+ Another way to demonstrate this model is drawing parallels between::
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mount -t overlay overlay -olowerdir=/lower,upperdir=/upper,... /merged
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- and
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+ and::
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cp -a /lower /upper
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mount --bind /upper /merged
@@ -328,7 +328,7 @@ Multiple lower layers
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---------------------
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Multiple lower layers can now be given using the colon (":") as a
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- separator character between the directory names. For example:
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+ separator character between the directory names. For example::
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mount -t overlay overlay -olowerdir=/lower1:/lower2:/lower3 /merged
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@@ -340,13 +340,13 @@ rightmost one and going left. In the above example lower1 will be the
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top, lower2 the middle and lower3 the bottom layer.
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Note: directory names containing colons can be provided as lower layer by
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- escaping the colons with a single backslash. For example:
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+ escaping the colons with a single backslash. For example::
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mount -t overlay overlay -olowerdir=/a\:lower\:\:dir /merged
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Since kernel version v6.8, directory names containing colons can also
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be configured as lower layer using the "lowerdir+" mount options and the
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- fsconfig syscall from new mount api. For example:
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+ fsconfig syscall from new mount api. For example::
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fsconfig(fs_fd, FSCONFIG_SET_STRING, "lowerdir+", "/a:lower::dir", 0);
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@@ -356,7 +356,7 @@ as an octal characters (\072) when displayed in /proc/self/mountinfo.
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Metadata only copy up
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---------------------
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- When metadata only copy up feature is enabled, overlayfs will only copy
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+ When the "metacopy" feature is enabled, overlayfs will only copy
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up metadata (as opposed to whole file), when a metadata specific operation
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like chown/chmod is performed. Full file will be copied up later when
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file is opened for WRITE operation.
@@ -405,7 +405,7 @@ A normal lower layer is not allowed to be below a data-only layer, so single
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colon separators are not allowed to the right of double colon ("::") separators.
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- For example:
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+ For example::
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mount -t overlay overlay -olowerdir=/l1:/l2:/l3::/do1::/do2 /merged
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@@ -419,7 +419,7 @@ to the absolute path of the "lower data" file in the "data-only" lower layer.
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Since kernel version v6.8, "data-only" lower layers can also be added using
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the "datadir+" mount options and the fsconfig syscall from new mount api.
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- For example:
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+ For example::
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fsconfig(fs_fd, FSCONFIG_SET_STRING, "lowerdir+", "/l1", 0);
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fsconfig(fs_fd, FSCONFIG_SET_STRING, "lowerdir+", "/l2", 0);
@@ -429,7 +429,7 @@ For example:
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fs-verity support
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- ----------------------
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+ -----------------
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During metadata copy up of a lower file, if the source file has
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fs-verity enabled and overlay verity support is enabled, then the
@@ -492,27 +492,27 @@ though it will not result in a crash or deadlock.
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Mounting an overlay using an upper layer path, where the upper layer path
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was previously used by another mounted overlay in combination with a
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- different lower layer path, is allowed, unless the "inodes index" feature
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- or "metadata only copy up" feature is enabled.
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+ different lower layer path, is allowed, unless the "index" or "metacopy"
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+ features are enabled.
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- With the "inodes index" feature, on the first time mount, an NFS file
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+ With the "index" feature, on the first time mount, an NFS file
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handle of the lower layer root directory, along with the UUID of the lower
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filesystem, are encoded and stored in the "trusted.overlay.origin" extended
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attribute on the upper layer root directory. On subsequent mount attempts,
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the lower root directory file handle and lower filesystem UUID are compared
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to the stored origin in upper root directory. On failure to verify the
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lower root origin, mount will fail with ESTALE. An overlayfs mount with
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- "inodes index" enabled will fail with EOPNOTSUPP if the lower filesystem
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+ "index" enabled will fail with EOPNOTSUPP if the lower filesystem
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does not support NFS export, lower filesystem does not have a valid UUID or
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if the upper filesystem does not support extended attributes.
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- For "metadata only copy up" feature there is no verification mechanism at
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+ For the "metacopy" feature, there is no verification mechanism at
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mount time. So if same upper is mounted with different set of lower, mount
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probably will succeed but expect the unexpected later on. So don't do it.
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It is quite a common practice to copy overlay layers to a different
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directory tree on the same or different underlying filesystem, and even
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- to a different machine. With the "inodes index" feature, trying to mount
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+ to a different machine. With the "index" feature, trying to mount
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the copied layers will fail the verification of the lower root file handle.
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Nesting overlayfs mounts
@@ -547,28 +547,30 @@ filesystem.
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This is the list of cases that overlayfs doesn't currently handle:
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- a) POSIX mandates updating st_atime for reads. This is currently not
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- done in the case when the file resides on a lower layer.
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+ a) POSIX mandates updating st_atime for reads. This is currently not
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+ done in the case when the file resides on a lower layer.
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- b) If a file residing on a lower layer is opened for read-only and then
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- memory mapped with MAP_SHARED, then subsequent changes to the file are not
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- reflected in the memory mapping.
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+ b) If a file residing on a lower layer is opened for read-only and then
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+ memory mapped with MAP_SHARED, then subsequent changes to the file are not
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+ reflected in the memory mapping.
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- c) If a file residing on a lower layer is being executed, then opening that
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- file for write or truncating the file will not be denied with ETXTBSY.
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+ c) If a file residing on a lower layer is being executed, then opening that
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+ file for write or truncating the file will not be denied with ETXTBSY.
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The following options allow overlayfs to act more like a standards
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compliant filesystem:
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- 1) "redirect_dir"
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+ redirect_dir
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+ ````````````
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Enabled with the mount option or module option: "redirect_dir=on" or with
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the kernel config option CONFIG_OVERLAY_FS_REDIRECT_DIR=y.
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If this feature is disabled, then rename(2) on a lower or merged directory
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will fail with EXDEV ("Invalid cross-device link").
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- 2) "inode index"
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+ index
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+ `````
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Enabled with the mount option or module option "index=on" or with the
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kernel config option CONFIG_OVERLAY_FS_INDEX=y.
@@ -577,7 +579,8 @@ If this feature is disabled and a file with multiple hard links is copied
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up, then this will "break" the link. Changes will not be propagated to
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other names referring to the same inode.
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- 3) "xino"
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+ xino
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+ ````
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Enabled with the mount option "xino=auto" or "xino=on", with the module
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option "xino_auto=on" or with the kernel config option
@@ -604,7 +607,7 @@ a crash or deadlock.
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Offline changes, when the overlay is not mounted, are allowed to the
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upper tree. Offline changes to the lower tree are only allowed if the
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- "metadata only copy up ", "inode index", "xino" and "redirect_dir" features
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+ "metacopy ", "index", "xino" and "redirect_dir" features
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have not been used. If the lower tree is modified and any of these
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features has been used, the behavior of the overlay is undefined,
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though it will not result in a crash or deadlock.
@@ -644,12 +647,13 @@ directory inode.
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When encoding a file handle from an overlay filesystem object, the
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following rules apply:
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- 1. For a non-upper object, encode a lower file handle from lower inode
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- 2. For an indexed object, encode a lower file handle from copy_up origin
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- 3. For a pure-upper object and for an existing non-indexed upper object,
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- encode an upper file handle from upper inode
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+ 1. For a non-upper object, encode a lower file handle from lower inode
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+ 2. For an indexed object, encode a lower file handle from copy_up origin
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+ 3. For a pure-upper object and for an existing non-indexed upper object,
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+ encode an upper file handle from upper inode
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The encoded overlay file handle includes:
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+
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- Header including path type information (e.g. lower/upper)
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- UUID of the underlying filesystem
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- Underlying filesystem encoding of underlying inode
@@ -659,15 +663,15 @@ are stored in extended attribute "trusted.overlay.origin".
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When decoding an overlay file handle, the following steps are followed:
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- 1. Find underlying layer by UUID and path type information.
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- 2. Decode the underlying filesystem file handle to underlying dentry.
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- 3. For a lower file handle, lookup the handle in index directory by name.
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- 4. If a whiteout is found in index, return ESTALE. This represents an
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- overlay object that was deleted after its file handle was encoded.
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- 5. For a non-directory, instantiate a disconnected overlay dentry from the
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- decoded underlying dentry, the path type and index inode, if found.
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- 6. For a directory, use the connected underlying decoded dentry, path type
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- and index, to lookup a connected overlay dentry.
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+ 1. Find underlying layer by UUID and path type information.
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+ 2. Decode the underlying filesystem file handle to underlying dentry.
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+ 3. For a lower file handle, lookup the handle in index directory by name.
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+ 4. If a whiteout is found in index, return ESTALE. This represents an
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+ overlay object that was deleted after its file handle was encoded.
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+ 5. For a non-directory, instantiate a disconnected overlay dentry from the
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+ decoded underlying dentry, the path type and index inode, if found.
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+ 6. For a directory, use the connected underlying decoded dentry, path type
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+ and index, to lookup a connected overlay dentry.
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Decoding a non-directory file handle may return a disconnected dentry.
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copy_up of that disconnected dentry will create an upper index entry with
@@ -770,9 +774,9 @@ Testsuite
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There's a testsuite originally developed by David Howells and currently
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maintained by Amir Goldstein at:
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- https://github.com/amir73il/unionmount-testsuite.git
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+ https://github.com/amir73il/unionmount-testsuite.git
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- Run as root:
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+ Run as root::
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# cd unionmount-testsuite
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# ./run --ov --verify
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