Hi Linus and folks,
DEPT(DEPendency Tracker) is a runtime deadlock detection framework that sees what lockdep cannot.
I'm thrilled to share that DEPT has moved beyond theory and is now catching real deadlocks in the wild:
https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/6383cde5-cf4b-facf-6e07-1378a485657d@I-love.SAK... https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/1674268856-31807-1-git-send-email-byungchul.par... https://lore.kernel.org/all/b6e00e77-4a8c-4e05-ab79-266bf05fcc2d@igalia.com/
I've added comprehensive documentation explaining DEPT's design and usage. Getting started is as simple as enabling CONFIG_DEPT and watching dmesg.
THE PROBLEM LOCKDEP CANNOT SOLVE --------------------------------
Lockdep has been our trusted deadlock detector for two decades, but it has a fundamental blind spot: it tracks lock acquisition order, not the actual waits and events that cause deadlocks. This means lockdep misses:
* Deadlocks involving folio locks (not released within the context) * Cross-context synchronization like wait_for_completion()/complete() * DMA fence waits, RCU waits, and general waitqueue patterns * Any synchronization primitive outside the classic lock/unlock model
Consider this real deadlock pattern that lockdep cannot detect:
context X context Y context Z
mutex_lock A folio_lock B folio_lock B <- DEADLOCK mutex_lock A <- DEADLOCK folio_unlock B folio_unlock B mutex_unlock A mutex_unlock A
Lockdep sees lock acquisitions. DEPT sees the actual dependency:
"mutex_unlock A in context Y cannot happen until folio_lock B is awakened by the owner's folio_unlock B, and vice versa in context Z."
It's a circular dependency that means deadlock.
THE DEPT APPROACH -----------------
DEPT asks a simpler question: "What is this context waiting for, and what event will wake it up?"
Every deadlock is fundamentally about unreachable events. DEPT tracks:
[S] Where an event context begins (the code path that will trigger an event) [W] Where a wait for another event apears between [S] and [E] [E] Where the event for [S] occurs
By building a dependency graph of "[E] cannot occur until the event that [W] waits for occurs", DEPT detects circular dependencies regardless of the underlying synchronization primitives involved.
WHAT DEPT BRINGS TO THE TABLE -----------------------------
* Universal coverage: Works with any wait/event-based synchronization, not just locks * Correct read-lock handling: No more blind spots for read-side dependencies * Continuous operation: Unlike lockdep, DEPT keeps running after reports, catching multiple deadlocks in a single session * Clean annotation API: Simple, intuitive interfaces for subsystem maintainers to refine detection * Battle-tested: Already catching real deadlocks as the links above demonstrate
FALSE POSITIVES: THE HONEST CONVERSATION ----------------------------------------
Like any powerful detection tool, DEPT faces the false positive challenge. This is not unique to DEPT — lockdep spent years building its annotation infrastructure (lock classes, subclasses, lockdep_map) to separate real bugs from intentional patterns.
DEPT is on the same journey. We have:
* Event site recovery: Declare when an event has fallback paths * Subclass-based classification: Distinguish per-CPU, per-device, and modality-specific waits * Page usage tracking: Separate block device mappings from regular file mappings to avoid spurious reports (currently being worked on)
But comprehensive annotation requires subsystem maintainer expertise. This is where I need your help.
THE PATH TO MAINLINE --------------------
DEPT is marked EXPERIMENTAL in Kconfig for a reason. Like lockdep, it will mature through collaboration:
1. Core framework: Stabilized and ready for review 2. Subsystem pilots: Working with maintainers to add annotations where they matter most (mm, block, drm, networking, ...) 3. Gradual enablement: DEPT and lockdep coexist; DEPT takes over dependency checking when ready
I am not proposing to replace lockdep. Lockdep's lock usage validation remains invaluable. The vision is:
LOCKDEP: Validates correct lock usage | v DEPT: Performs dependency checking with full wait/event coverage
WHY MERGE NOW? --------------
Some might suggest: "Fix all false positives out-of-tree first." But the affected subsystems span the entire kernel. Like lockdep's two-decade annotation journey, DEPT needs mainline visibility for:
* Proper annotation placement (maintainers know their code best) * Real-world testing across configurations and workloads * Incremental improvement through community feedback
CONFIG_DEPT is opt-in. It won't affect your default kernel build. But for those debugging complex synchronization issues, DEPT is ready to help today.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ---------------
This work would not be possible without:
Harry Yoo harry.yoo@oracle.com Gwan-gyeong Mun gwan-gyeong.mun@intel.com Yunseong Kim ysk@kzalloc.com Yeoreum Yun yeoreum.yun@arm.com
And the countless kernel developers whose lockdep annotations over two decades showed us the path forward.
FAQ ---
Q. Isn't this the cross-release feature that got reverted?
A. Cross-release (commit b09be676e0ff2) attempted to extend lockdep with wait/event tracking. It found real bugs but introduced false positives that masked further issues. DEPT learns from that experience with a cleaner design and flexible reporting that makes false positives less disruptive.
Q. Why not build DEPT into lockdep?
A. Lockdep is stable, battle-tested code. I chose separation because while DEPT borrows BFS and hashing ideas, the wait/event model requires rebuilding from scratch. Lockdep was designed for lock acquisition order — retrofitting it would risk its stability.
Q. Will DEPT replace lockdep?
A. No. Lockdep validates correct lock usage — that's not going away. DEPT supersedes only the dependency-checking logic when mature.
Q. Should we merge DEPT now or wait for more annotations out-of-tree?
A. Now. The annotation journey requires mainline collaboration. Lockdep didn't become useful overnight — it grew through maintainer contributions. DEPT needs the same path.
Q. What if I enable DEPT and get false positives?
A. That's the point — report them. Work with us to add annotations that distinguish your intentional patterns from real deadlocks. This is how lockdep became indispensable, and it's how DEPT will too.
GETTING STARTED ---------------
1. Enable CONFIG_DEPT (EXPERIMENTAL) 2. Boot your kernel 3. Check dmesg for DEPT reports 4. Read Documentation/dev-tools/dept.rst for interpretation
DEPT is a tool for understanding your code's synchronization behavior. Even if you never see a deadlock report, the visibility it provides is invaluable.
I look forward to your feedback, patches, and collaboration. Let's make DEPT as indispensable to kernel developers as lockdep has been. --- Changes from v18:
1. Rebase on v7.0. 2. Add 'Reviewed-by: Jeff Layton jlayton@kernel.org' on 37th patch, 'SUNRPC: relocate struct rcu_head to the first field of struct rpc_xprt'. (thanks to Jeff Layton) 3. Refine and supplement dept documents and comments, and fix typos. (feedbacked by Bagas Sanjaya and Yunseong Kim) 4. Add __rust_helper to rust_helper_wait_for_completion(). (feedbacked by Dirk Behme) 5. Remove the part supporting recover events tracking - I will keep maintaining it out of tree tho - as it unnecessarily complicates the initial DEPT patchset and significantly increases the review burden. 6. Get rid of 'extern' keyword with function declarations. (feedbacked by Petr Pavlu)
Changes from v17:
1. Rebase on the mainline as of 2025 Dec 5. 2. Convert the documents' format from txt to rst. (feedbacked by Jonathan Corbet and Bagas Sanjaya) 3. Move the documents from 'Documentation/dependency' to 'Documentation/dev-tools'. (feedbakced by Jonathan Corbet) 4. Improve the documentation. (feedbacked by NeilBrown) 5. Use a common function, enter_from_user_mode(), instead of arch specific code, to notice context switch from user mode. (feedbacked by Dave Hansen, Mark Rutland, and Mark Brown) 6. Resolve the header dependency issue by using dept's internal header, instead of relocating 'struct llist_{head,node}' to another header. (feedbacked by Greg KH) 7. Improve page(or folio) usage type APIs. 8. Add rust helper for wait_for_completion(). (feedbacked by Guangbo Cui, Boqun Feng, and Danilo Krummrich) 9. Refine some commit messages.
Changes from v16:
1. Rebase on v6.17. 2. Fix a false positive from rcu (by Yunseong Kim) 3. Introduce APIs to set page's usage, dept_set_page_usage() and dept_reset_page_usage() to avoid false positives. 4. Consider lock_page() as a potential wait unconditionally. 5. Consider folio_lock_killable() as a potential wait unconditionally. 6. Add support for tracking PG_writeback waits and events. 7. Fix two build errors due to the additional debug information added by dept. (by Yunseong Kim)
Changes from v15:
1. Fix typo and improve comments and commit messages (feedbacked by ALOK TIWARI, Waiman Long, and kernel test robot). 2. Do not stop dept on detection of cicular dependency of recover event, allowing to keep reporting. 3. Add SK hynix to copyright. 4. Consider folio_lock() as a potential wait unconditionally. 5. Fix Kconfig dependency bug (feedbacked by kernel test rebot). 6. Do not suppress reports that involve classes even that have already involved in other reports, allowing to keep reporting.
Changes from v14:
1. Rebase on the current latest, v6.15-rc6. 2. Refactor dept code. 3. With multi event sites for a single wait, even if an event forms a circular dependency, the event can be recovered by other event(or wake up) paths. Even though informing the circular dependency is worthy but it should be suppressed once informing it, if it doesn't lead an actual deadlock. So introduce APIs to annotate the relationship between event site and recover site, that are, event_site() and dept_recover_event(). 4. wait_for_completion() worked with dept map embedded in struct completion. However, it generates a few false positves since all the waits using the instance of struct completion, share the map and key. To avoid the false positves, make it not to share the map and key but each wait_for_completion() caller have its own key by default. Of course, external maps also can be used if needed. 5. Fix a bug about hardirq on/off tracing. 6. Implement basic unit test for dept. 7. Add more supports for dma fence synchronization. 8. Add emergency stop of dept e.g. on panic(). 9. Fix false positives by mmu_notifier_invalidate_*(). 10. Fix recursive call bug by DEPT_WARN_*() and DEPT_STOP(). 11. Fix trivial bugs in DEPT_WARN_*() and DEPT_STOP(). 12. Fix a bug that a spin lock, dept_pool_spin, is used in both contexts of irq disabled and enabled without irq disabled. 13. Suppress reports with classes, any of that already have been reported, even though they have different chains but being barely meaningful. 14. Print stacktrace of the wait that an event is now waking up, not only stacktrace of the event. 15. Make dept aware of lockdep_cmp_fn() that is used to avoid false positives in lockdep so that dept can also avoid them. 16. Do do_event() only if there are no ecxts have been delimited. 17. Fix a bug that was not synchronized for stage_m in struct dept_task, using a spin lock, dept_task()->stage_lock. 18. Fix a bug that dept didn't handle the case that multiple ttwus for a single waiter can be called at the same time e.i. a race issue. 19. Distinguish each kernel context from others, not only by system call but also by user oriented fault so that dept can work with more accuracy information about kernel context. That helps to avoid a few false positives. 20. Limit dept's working to x86_64 and arm64.
Changes from v13:
1. Rebase on the current latest version, v6.9-rc7. 2. Add 'dept' documentation describing dept APIs.
Changes from v12:
1. Refine the whole document for dept. 2. Add 'Interpret dept report' section in the document, using a deadlock report obtained in practice. Hope this version of document helps guys understand dept better.
https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/6383cde5-cf4b-facf-6e07-1378a485657d@I-love.SAK... https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/1674268856-31807-1-git-send-email-byungchul.par...
Changes from v11:
1. Add 'dept' documentation describing the concept of dept. 2. Rewrite the commit messages of the following commits for using weaker lockdep annotation, for better description.
fs/jbd2: Use a weaker annotation in journal handling cpu/hotplug: Use a weaker annotation in AP thread
(feedbacked by Thomas Gleixner)
Changes from v10:
1. Fix noinstr warning when building kernel source. 2. dept has been reporting some false positives due to the folio lock's unfairness. Reflect it and make dept work based on dept annotaions instead of just wait and wake up primitives. 3. Remove the support for PG_writeback while working on 2. I will add the support later if needed. 4. dept didn't print stacktrace for [S] if the participant of a deadlock is not lock mechanism but general wait and event. However, it made hard to interpret the report in that case. So add support to print stacktrace of the requestor who asked the event context to run - usually a waiter of the event does it just before going to wait state. 5. Give up tracking raw_local_irq_{disable,enable}() since it totally messed up dept's irq tracking. So make it work in the same way as lockdep does. I will consider it once any false positives by those are observed again. 6. Change the manual rwsem_acquire_read(->j_trans_commit_map) annotation in fs/jbd2/transaction.c to the try version so that it works as much as it exactly needs. 7. Remove unnecessary 'inline' keyword in dept.c and add '__maybe_unused' to a needed place.
Changes from v9:
1. Fix a bug. SDT tracking didn't work well because of my big mistake that I should've used waiter's map to indentify its class but it had been working with waker's one. FYI, PG_locked and PG_writeback weren't affected. They still worked well. (reported by YoungJun) Changes from v8:
1. Fix build error by adding EXPORT_SYMBOL(PG_locked_map) and EXPORT_SYMBOL(PG_writeback_map) for kernel module build - appologize for that. (reported by kernel test robot) 2. Fix build error by removing header file's circular dependency that was caused by "atomic.h", "kernel.h" and "irqflags.h", which I introduced - appolgize for that. (reported by kernel test robot)
Changes from v7:
1. Fix a bug that cannot track rwlock dependency properly, introduced in v7. (reported by Boqun and lockdep selftest) 2. Track wait/event of PG_{locked,writeback} more aggressively assuming that when a bit of PG_{locked,writeback} is cleared there might be waits on the bit. (reported by Linus, Hillf and syzbot) 3. Fix and clean bad style code e.i. unnecessarily introduced a randome pattern and so on. (pointed out by Linux) 4. Clean code for applying dept to wait_for_completion().
Changes from v6:
1. Tie to task scheduler code to track sleep and try_to_wake_up() assuming sleeps cause waits, try_to_wake_up()s would be the events that those are waiting for, of course with proper dept annotations, sdt_might_sleep_weak(), sdt_might_sleep_strong() and so on. For these cases, class is classified at sleep entrance rather than the synchronization initialization code. Which would extremely reduce false alarms. 2. Remove the dept associated instance in each page struct for tracking dependencies by PG_locked and PG_writeback thanks to the 1. work above. 3. Introduce CONFIG_dept_AGGRESIVE_TIMEOUT_WAIT to suppress reports that waits with timeout set are involved, for those who don't like verbose reporting. 4. Add a mechanism to refill the internal memory pools on running out so that dept could keep working as long as free memory is available in the system. 5. Re-enable tracking hashed-waitqueue wait. That's going to no longer generate false positives because class is classified at sleep entrance rather than the waitqueue initailization. 6. Refactor to make it easier to port onto each new version of the kernel. 7. Apply dept to dma fence. 8. Do trivial optimizaitions.
Changes from v5:
1. Use just pr_warn_once() rather than WARN_ONCE() on the lack of internal resources because WARN_*() printing stacktrace is too much for informing the lack. (feedback from Ted, Hyeonggon) 2. Fix trivial bugs like missing initializing a struct before using it. 3. Assign a different class per task when handling onstack variables for waitqueue or the like. Which makes dept distinguish between onstack variables of different tasks so as to prevent false positives. (reported by Hyeonggon) 4. Make dept aware of even raw_local_irq_*() to prevent false positives. (reported by Hyeonggon) 5. Don't consider dependencies between the events that might be triggered within __schedule() and the waits that requires __schedule(), real ones. (reported by Hyeonggon) 6. Unstage the staged wait that has prepare_to_wait_event()'ed *and* yet to get to __schedule(), if we encounter __schedule() in-between for another sleep, which is possible if e.g. a mutex_lock() exists in 'condition' of ___wait_event(). 7. Turn on CONFIG_PROVE_LOCKING when CONFIG_DEPT is on, to rely on the hardirq and softirq entrance tracing to make dept more portable for now.
Changes from v4:
1. Fix some bugs that produce false alarms. 2. Distinguish each syscall context from another *for arm64*. 3. Make it not warn it but just print it in case dept ring buffer gets exhausted. (feedback from Hyeonggon) 4. Explicitely describe "EXPERIMENTAL" and "dept might produce false positive reports" in Kconfig. (feedback from Ted)
Changes from v3:
1. dept shouldn't create dependencies between different depths of a class that were indicated by *_lock_nested(). dept normally doesn't but it does once another lock class comes in. So fixed it. (feedback from Hyeonggon) 2. dept considered a wait as a real wait once getting to __schedule() even if it has been set to TASK_RUNNING by wake up sources in advance. Fixed it so that dept doesn't consider the case as a real wait. (feedback from Jan Kara) 3. Stop tracking dependencies with a map once the event associated with the map has been handled. dept will start to work with the map again, on the next sleep.
Changes from v2:
1. Disable dept on bit_wait_table[] in sched/wait_bit.c reporting a lot of false positives, which is my fault. Wait/event for bit_wait_table[] should've been tagged in a higher layer for better work, which is a future work. (feedback from Jan Kara) 2. Disable dept on crypto_larval's completion to prevent a false positive.
Changes from v1:
1. Fix coding style and typo. (feedback from Steven) 2. Distinguish each work context from another in workqueue. 3. Skip checking lock acquisition with nest_lock, which is about correct lock usage that should be checked by lockdep.
Changes from RFC(v0):
1. Prevent adding a wait tag at prepare_to_wait() but __schedule(). (feedback from Linus and Matthew) 2. Use try version at lockdep_acquire_cpus_lock() annotation. 3. Distinguish each syscall context from another.
Byungchul Park (39): dept: implement DEPT(DEPendency Tracker) dept: add single event dependency tracker APIs dept: add lock dependency tracker APIs dept: tie to lockdep and IRQ tracing dept: add proc knobs to show stats and dependency graph dept: distinguish each kernel context from another dept: distinguish each work from another dept: add a mechanism to refill the internal memory pools on running out dept: record the latest one out of consecutive waits of the same class dept: apply sdt_might_sleep_{start,end}() to wait_for_completion()/complete() dept: apply sdt_might_sleep_{start,end}() to swait dept: apply sdt_might_sleep_{start,end}() to waitqueue wait dept: apply sdt_might_sleep_{start,end}() to hashed-waitqueue wait dept: apply sdt_might_sleep_{start,end}() to dma fence dept: track timeout waits separately with a new Kconfig dept: apply timeout consideration to wait_for_completion()/complete() dept: apply timeout consideration to swait dept: apply timeout consideration to waitqueue wait dept: apply timeout consideration to hashed-waitqueue wait dept: apply timeout consideration to dma fence wait dept: make dept able to work with an external wgen dept: track PG_locked with dept dept: print staged wait's stacktrace on report locking/lockdep: prevent various lockdep assertions when lockdep_off()'ed dept: add documents for dept cpu/hotplug: use a weaker annotation in AP thread dept: assign dept map to mmu notifier invalidation synchronization dept: assign unique dept_key to each distinct dma fence caller dept: make dept aware of lockdep_set_lock_cmp_fn() annotation dept: make dept stop from working on debug_locks_off() dept: assign unique dept_key to each distinct wait_for_completion() caller completion, dept: introduce init_completion_dmap() API dept: call dept_hardirqs_off() in local_irq_*() regardless of irq state dept: introduce APIs to set page usage and use subclasses_evt for the usage dept: track PG_writeback with dept SUNRPC: relocate struct rcu_head to the first field of struct rpc_xprt mm: percpu: increase PERCPU_DYNAMIC_SIZE_SHIFT on DEPT and large PAGE_SIZE rust: completion: Add __rust_helper to rust_helper_wait_for_completion() dept: implement a basic unit test for dept
Yunseong Kim (1): rcu/update: fix same dept key collision between various types of RCU
Documentation/dev-tools/dept.rst | 905 ++++++++ Documentation/dev-tools/dept_api.rst | 124 + Documentation/dev-tools/index.rst | 2 + drivers/dma-buf/dma-fence.c | 23 +- include/linux/completion.h | 124 +- include/linux/dept.h | 267 +++ include/linux/dept_ldt.h | 78 + include/linux/dept_sdt.h | 68 + include/linux/dept_unit_test.h | 61 + include/linux/dma-fence.h | 74 +- include/linux/hardirq.h | 3 + include/linux/irq-entry-common.h | 4 + include/linux/irqflags.h | 21 +- include/linux/local_lock_internal.h | 1 + include/linux/lockdep.h | 105 +- include/linux/lockdep_types.h | 3 + include/linux/mm_types.h | 4 + include/linux/mmu_notifier.h | 26 + include/linux/mutex.h | 1 + include/linux/page-flags.h | 217 +- include/linux/pagemap.h | 37 +- include/linux/percpu-rwsem.h | 2 +- include/linux/percpu.h | 4 + include/linux/rcupdate_wait.h | 13 +- include/linux/rtmutex.h | 1 + include/linux/rwlock_types.h | 1 + include/linux/rwsem.h | 1 + include/linux/sched.h | 111 + include/linux/seqlock.h | 2 +- include/linux/spinlock_types_raw.h | 3 + include/linux/srcu.h | 2 +- include/linux/sunrpc/xprt.h | 9 +- include/linux/swait.h | 3 + include/linux/wait.h | 3 + include/linux/wait_bit.h | 3 + init/init_task.c | 2 + init/main.c | 2 + kernel/Makefile | 1 + kernel/cpu.c | 2 +- kernel/dependency/Makefile | 5 + kernel/dependency/dept.c | 3222 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ kernel/dependency/dept_hash.h | 10 + kernel/dependency/dept_internal.h | 314 +++ kernel/dependency/dept_object.h | 13 + kernel/dependency/dept_proc.c | 94 + kernel/dependency/dept_unit_test.c | 149 ++ kernel/exit.c | 1 + kernel/fork.c | 2 + kernel/locking/lockdep.c | 33 + kernel/module/main.c | 2 + kernel/rcu/rcu.h | 1 + kernel/rcu/update.c | 5 +- kernel/sched/completion.c | 62 +- kernel/sched/core.c | 9 + kernel/workqueue.c | 3 + lib/Kconfig.debug | 48 + lib/debug_locks.c | 2 + lib/locking-selftest.c | 2 + mm/filemap.c | 38 + mm/mm_init.c | 3 + mm/mmu_notifier.c | 31 +- rust/helpers/completion.c | 5 + 62 files changed, 6247 insertions(+), 120 deletions(-) create mode 100644 Documentation/dev-tools/dept.rst create mode 100644 Documentation/dev-tools/dept_api.rst create mode 100644 include/linux/dept.h create mode 100644 include/linux/dept_ldt.h create mode 100644 include/linux/dept_sdt.h create mode 100644 include/linux/dept_unit_test.h create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/Makefile create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/dept.c create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/dept_hash.h create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/dept_internal.h create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/dept_object.h create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/dept_proc.c create mode 100644 kernel/dependency/dept_unit_test.c
base-commit: 028ef9c96e96197026887c0f092424679298aae8