xref: /linux/Documentation/RCU/checklist.rst (revision 68a052239fc4b351e961f698b824f7654a346091)
1.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
2
3================================
4Review Checklist for RCU Patches
5================================
6
7
8This document contains a checklist for producing and reviewing patches
9that make use of RCU.  Violating any of the rules listed below will
10result in the same sorts of problems that leaving out a locking primitive
11would cause.  This list is based on experiences reviewing such patches
12over a rather long period of time, but improvements are always welcome!
13
140.	Is RCU being applied to a read-mostly situation?  If the data
15	structure is updated more than about 10% of the time, then you
16	should strongly consider some other approach, unless detailed
17	performance measurements show that RCU is nonetheless the right
18	tool for the job.  Yes, RCU does reduce read-side overhead by
19	increasing write-side overhead, which is exactly why normal uses
20	of RCU will do much more reading than updating.
21
22	Another exception is where performance is not an issue, and RCU
23	provides a simpler implementation.  An example of this situation
24	is the dynamic NMI code in the Linux 2.6 kernel, at least on
25	architectures where NMIs are rare.
26
27	Yet another exception is where the low real-time latency of RCU's
28	read-side primitives is critically important.
29
30	One final exception is where RCU readers are used to prevent
31	the ABA problem (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ABA_problem)
32	for lockless updates.  This does result in the mildly
33	counter-intuitive situation where rcu_read_lock() and
34	rcu_read_unlock() are used to protect updates, however, this
35	approach can provide the same simplifications to certain types
36	of lockless algorithms that garbage collectors do.
37
381.	Does the update code have proper mutual exclusion?
39
40	RCU does allow *readers* to run (almost) naked, but *writers* must
41	still use some sort of mutual exclusion, such as:
42
43	a.	locking,
44	b.	atomic operations, or
45	c.	restricting updates to a single task.
46
47	If you choose #b, be prepared to describe how you have handled
48	memory barriers on weakly ordered machines (pretty much all of
49	them -- even x86 allows later loads to be reordered to precede
50	earlier stores), and be prepared to explain why this added
51	complexity is worthwhile.  If you choose #c, be prepared to
52	explain how this single task does not become a major bottleneck
53	on large systems (for example, if the task is updating information
54	relating to itself that other tasks can read, there by definition
55	can be no bottleneck).	Note that the definition of "large" has
56	changed significantly:	Eight CPUs was "large" in the year 2000,
57	but a hundred CPUs was unremarkable in 2017.
58
592.	Do the RCU read-side critical sections make proper use of
60	rcu_read_lock() and friends?  These primitives are needed
61	to prevent grace periods from ending prematurely, which
62	could result in data being unceremoniously freed out from
63	under your read-side code, which can greatly increase the
64	actuarial risk of your kernel.
65
66	As a rough rule of thumb, any dereference of an RCU-protected
67	pointer must be covered by rcu_read_lock(), rcu_read_lock_bh(),
68	rcu_read_lock_sched(), or by the appropriate update-side lock.
69	Explicit disabling of preemption (preempt_disable(), for example)
70	can serve as rcu_read_lock_sched(), but is less readable and
71	prevents lockdep from detecting locking issues.  Acquiring a
72	raw spinlock also enters an RCU read-side critical section.
73
74	The guard(rcu)() and scoped_guard(rcu) primitives designate
75	the remainder of the current scope or the next statement,
76	respectively, as the RCU read-side critical section.  Use of
77	these guards can be less error-prone than rcu_read_lock(),
78	rcu_read_unlock(), and friends.
79
80	Please note that you *cannot* rely on code known to be built
81	only in non-preemptible kernels.  Such code can and will break,
82	especially in kernels built with CONFIG_PREEMPT_COUNT=y.
83
84	Letting RCU-protected pointers "leak" out of an RCU read-side
85	critical section is every bit as bad as letting them leak out
86	from under a lock.  Unless, of course, you have arranged some
87	other means of protection, such as a lock or a reference count
88	*before* letting them out of the RCU read-side critical section.
89
903.	Does the update code tolerate concurrent accesses?
91
92	The whole point of RCU is to permit readers to run without
93	any locks or atomic operations.  This means that readers will
94	be running while updates are in progress.  There are a number
95	of ways to handle this concurrency, depending on the situation:
96
97	a.	Use the RCU variants of the list and hlist update
98		primitives to add, remove, and replace elements on
99		an RCU-protected list.	Alternatively, use the other
100		RCU-protected data structures that have been added to
101		the Linux kernel.
102
103		This is almost always the best approach.
104
105	b.	Proceed as in (a) above, but also maintain per-element
106		locks (that are acquired by both readers and writers)
107		that guard per-element state.  Fields that the readers
108		refrain from accessing can be guarded by some other lock
109		acquired only by updaters, if desired.
110
111		This also works quite well.
112
113	c.	Make updates appear atomic to readers.	For example,
114		pointer updates to properly aligned fields will
115		appear atomic, as will individual atomic primitives.
116		Sequences of operations performed under a lock will *not*
117		appear to be atomic to RCU readers, nor will sequences
118		of multiple atomic primitives.	One alternative is to
119		move multiple individual fields to a separate structure,
120		thus solving the multiple-field problem by imposing an
121		additional level of indirection.
122
123		This can work, but is starting to get a bit tricky.
124
125	d.	Carefully order the updates and the reads so that readers
126		see valid data at all phases of the update.  This is often
127		more difficult than it sounds, especially given modern
128		CPUs' tendency to reorder memory references.  One must
129		usually liberally sprinkle memory-ordering operations
130		through the code, making it difficult to understand and
131		to test.  Where it works, it is better to use things
132		like smp_store_release() and smp_load_acquire(), but in
133		some cases the smp_mb() full memory barrier is required.
134
135		As noted earlier, it is usually better to group the
136		changing data into a separate structure, so that the
137		change may be made to appear atomic by updating a pointer
138		to reference a new structure containing updated values.
139
1404.	Weakly ordered CPUs pose special challenges.  Almost all CPUs
141	are weakly ordered -- even x86 CPUs allow later loads to be
142	reordered to precede earlier stores.  RCU code must take all of
143	the following measures to prevent memory-corruption problems:
144
145	a.	Readers must maintain proper ordering of their memory
146		accesses.  The rcu_dereference() primitive ensures that
147		the CPU picks up the pointer before it picks up the data
148		that the pointer points to.  This really is necessary
149		on Alpha CPUs.
150
151		The rcu_dereference() primitive is also an excellent
152		documentation aid, letting the person reading the
153		code know exactly which pointers are protected by RCU.
154		Please note that compilers can also reorder code, and
155		they are becoming increasingly aggressive about doing
156		just that.  The rcu_dereference() primitive therefore also
157		prevents destructive compiler optimizations.  However,
158		with a bit of devious creativity, it is possible to
159		mishandle the return value from rcu_dereference().
160		Please see rcu_dereference.rst for more information.
161
162		The rcu_dereference() primitive is used by the
163		various "_rcu()" list-traversal primitives, such
164		as the list_for_each_entry_rcu().  Note that it is
165		perfectly legal (if redundant) for update-side code to
166		use rcu_dereference() and the "_rcu()" list-traversal
167		primitives.  This is particularly useful in code that
168		is common to readers and updaters.  However, lockdep
169		will complain if you access rcu_dereference() outside
170		of an RCU read-side critical section.  See lockdep.rst
171		to learn what to do about this.
172
173		Of course, neither rcu_dereference() nor the "_rcu()"
174		list-traversal primitives can substitute for a good
175		concurrency design coordinating among multiple updaters.
176
177	b.	If the list macros are being used, the list_add_tail_rcu()
178		and list_add_rcu() primitives must be used in order
179		to prevent weakly ordered machines from misordering
180		structure initialization and pointer planting.
181		Similarly, if the hlist macros are being used, the
182		hlist_add_head_rcu() primitive is required.
183
184	c.	If the list macros are being used, the list_del_rcu()
185		primitive must be used to keep list_del()'s pointer
186		poisoning from inflicting toxic effects on concurrent
187		readers.  Similarly, if the hlist macros are being used,
188		the hlist_del_rcu() primitive is required.
189
190		The list_replace_rcu() and hlist_replace_rcu() primitives
191		may be used to replace an old structure with a new one
192		in their respective types of RCU-protected lists.
193
194	d.	Rules similar to (4b) and (4c) apply to the "hlist_nulls"
195		type of RCU-protected linked lists.
196
197	e.	Updates must ensure that initialization of a given
198		structure happens before pointers to that structure are
199		publicized.  Use the rcu_assign_pointer() primitive
200		when publicizing a pointer to a structure that can
201		be traversed by an RCU read-side critical section.
202
2035.	If any of call_rcu(), call_srcu(), call_rcu_tasks(), or
204	call_rcu_tasks_trace() is used, the callback function may be
205	invoked from softirq context, and in any case with bottom halves
206	disabled.  In particular, this callback function cannot block.
207	If you need the callback to block, run that code in a workqueue
208	handler scheduled from the callback.  The queue_rcu_work()
209	function does this for you in the case of call_rcu().
210
2116.	Since synchronize_rcu() can block, it cannot be called
212	from any sort of irq context.  The same rule applies
213	for synchronize_srcu(), synchronize_rcu_expedited(),
214	synchronize_srcu_expedited(), synchronize_rcu_tasks(),
215	synchronize_rcu_tasks_rude(), and synchronize_rcu_tasks_trace().
216
217	The expedited forms of these primitives have the same semantics
218	as the non-expedited forms, but expediting is more CPU intensive.
219	Use of the expedited primitives should be restricted to rare
220	configuration-change operations that would not normally be
221	undertaken while a real-time workload is running.  Note that
222	IPI-sensitive real-time workloads can use the rcupdate.rcu_normal
223	kernel boot parameter to completely disable expedited grace
224	periods, though this might have performance implications.
225
226	In particular, if you find yourself invoking one of the expedited
227	primitives repeatedly in a loop, please do everyone a favor:
228	Restructure your code so that it batches the updates, allowing
229	a single non-expedited primitive to cover the entire batch.
230	This will very likely be faster than the loop containing the
231	expedited primitive, and will be much much easier on the rest
232	of the system, especially to real-time workloads running on the
233	rest of the system.  Alternatively, instead use asynchronous
234	primitives such as call_rcu().
235
2367.	As of v4.20, a given kernel implements only one RCU flavor, which
237	is RCU-sched for PREEMPTION=n and RCU-preempt for PREEMPTION=y.
238	If the updater uses call_rcu() or synchronize_rcu(), then
239	the corresponding readers may use:  (1) rcu_read_lock() and
240	rcu_read_unlock(), (2) any pair of primitives that disables
241	and re-enables softirq, for example, rcu_read_lock_bh() and
242	rcu_read_unlock_bh(), or (3) any pair of primitives that disables
243	and re-enables preemption, for example, rcu_read_lock_sched() and
244	rcu_read_unlock_sched().  If the updater uses synchronize_srcu()
245	or call_srcu(), then the corresponding readers must use
246	srcu_read_lock() and srcu_read_unlock(), and with the same
247	srcu_struct.  The rules for the expedited RCU grace-period-wait
248	primitives are the same as for their non-expedited counterparts.
249
250	Similarly, it is necessary to correctly use the RCU Tasks flavors:
251
252	a.	If the updater uses synchronize_rcu_tasks() or
253		call_rcu_tasks(), then the readers must refrain from
254		executing voluntary context switches, that is, from
255		blocking.
256
257	b.	If the updater uses call_rcu_tasks_trace()
258		or synchronize_rcu_tasks_trace(), then the
259		corresponding readers must use rcu_read_lock_trace()
260		and rcu_read_unlock_trace().
261
262	c.	If an updater uses synchronize_rcu_tasks_rude(),
263		then the corresponding readers must use anything that
264		disables preemption, for example, preempt_disable()
265		and preempt_enable().
266
267	Mixing things up will result in confusion and broken kernels, and
268	has even resulted in an exploitable security issue.  Therefore,
269	when using non-obvious pairs of primitives, commenting is
270	of course a must.  One example of non-obvious pairing is
271	the XDP feature in networking, which calls BPF programs from
272	network-driver NAPI (softirq) context.	BPF relies heavily on RCU
273	protection for its data structures, but because the BPF program
274	invocation happens entirely within a single local_bh_disable()
275	section in a NAPI poll cycle, this usage is safe.  The reason
276	that this usage is safe is that readers can use anything that
277	disables BH when updaters use call_rcu() or synchronize_rcu().
278
2798.	Although synchronize_rcu() is slower than is call_rcu(),
280	it usually results in simpler code.  So, unless update
281	performance is critically important, the updaters cannot block,
282	or the latency of synchronize_rcu() is visible from userspace,
283	synchronize_rcu() should be used in preference to call_rcu().
284	Furthermore, kfree_rcu() and kvfree_rcu() usually result
285	in even simpler code than does synchronize_rcu() without
286	synchronize_rcu()'s multi-millisecond latency.	So please take
287	advantage of kfree_rcu()'s and kvfree_rcu()'s "fire and forget"
288	memory-freeing capabilities where it applies.
289
290	An especially important property of the synchronize_rcu()
291	primitive is that it automatically self-limits: if grace periods
292	are delayed for whatever reason, then the synchronize_rcu()
293	primitive will correspondingly delay updates.  In contrast,
294	code using call_rcu() should explicitly limit update rate in
295	cases where grace periods are delayed, as failing to do so can
296	result in excessive realtime latencies or even OOM conditions.
297
298	Ways of gaining this self-limiting property when using call_rcu(),
299	kfree_rcu(), or kvfree_rcu() include:
300
301	a.	Keeping a count of the number of data-structure elements
302		used by the RCU-protected data structure, including
303		those waiting for a grace period to elapse.  Enforce a
304		limit on this number, stalling updates as needed to allow
305		previously deferred frees to complete.	Alternatively,
306		limit only the number awaiting deferred free rather than
307		the total number of elements.
308
309		One way to stall the updates is to acquire the update-side
310		mutex.	(Don't try this with a spinlock -- other CPUs
311		spinning on the lock could prevent the grace period
312		from ever ending.)  Another way to stall the updates
313		is for the updates to use a wrapper function around
314		the memory allocator, so that this wrapper function
315		simulates OOM when there is too much memory awaiting an
316		RCU grace period.  There are of course many other
317		variations on this theme.
318
319	b.	Limiting update rate.  For example, if updates occur only
320		once per hour, then no explicit rate limiting is
321		required, unless your system is already badly broken.
322		Older versions of the dcache subsystem take this approach,
323		guarding updates with a global lock, limiting their rate.
324
325	c.	Trusted update -- if updates can only be done manually by
326		superuser or some other trusted user, then it might not
327		be necessary to automatically limit them.  The theory
328		here is that superuser already has lots of ways to crash
329		the machine.
330
331	d.	Periodically invoke rcu_barrier(), permitting a limited
332		number of updates per grace period.
333
334	The same cautions apply to call_srcu(), call_rcu_tasks(), and
335	call_rcu_tasks_trace().  This is why there is an srcu_barrier(),
336	rcu_barrier_tasks(), and rcu_barrier_tasks_trace(), respectively.
337
338	Note that although these primitives do take action to avoid
339	memory exhaustion when any given CPU has too many callbacks,
340	a determined user or administrator can still exhaust memory.
341	This is especially the case if a system with a large number of
342	CPUs has been configured to offload all of its RCU callbacks onto
343	a single CPU, or if the system has relatively little free memory.
344
3459.	All RCU list-traversal primitives, which include
346	rcu_dereference(), list_for_each_entry_rcu(), and
347	list_for_each_safe_rcu(), must be either within an RCU read-side
348	critical section or must be protected by appropriate update-side
349	locks.	RCU read-side critical sections are delimited by
350	rcu_read_lock() and rcu_read_unlock(), or by similar primitives
351	such as rcu_read_lock_bh() and rcu_read_unlock_bh(), in which
352	case the matching rcu_dereference() primitive must be used in
353	order to keep lockdep happy, in this case, rcu_dereference_bh().
354
355	The reason that it is permissible to use RCU list-traversal
356	primitives when the update-side lock is held is that doing so
357	can be quite helpful in reducing code bloat when common code is
358	shared between readers and updaters.  Additional primitives
359	are provided for this case, as discussed in lockdep.rst.
360
361	One exception to this rule is when data is only ever added to
362	the linked data structure, and is never removed during any
363	time that readers might be accessing that structure.  In such
364	cases, READ_ONCE() may be used in place of rcu_dereference()
365	and the read-side markers (rcu_read_lock() and rcu_read_unlock(),
366	for example) may be omitted.
367
36810.	Conversely, if you are in an RCU read-side critical section,
369	and you don't hold the appropriate update-side lock, you *must*
370	use the "_rcu()" variants of the list macros.  Failing to do so
371	will break Alpha, cause aggressive compilers to generate bad code,
372	and confuse people trying to understand your code.
373
37411.	Any lock acquired by an RCU callback must be acquired elsewhere
375	with softirq disabled, e.g., via spin_lock_bh().  Failing to
376	disable softirq on a given acquisition of that lock will result
377	in deadlock as soon as the RCU softirq handler happens to run
378	your RCU callback while interrupting that acquisition's critical
379	section.
380
38112.	RCU callbacks can be and are executed in parallel.  In many cases,
382	the callback code simply wrappers around kfree(), so that this
383	is not an issue (or, more accurately, to the extent that it is
384	an issue, the memory-allocator locking handles it).  However,
385	if the callbacks do manipulate a shared data structure, they
386	must use whatever locking or other synchronization is required
387	to safely access and/or modify that data structure.
388
389	Do not assume that RCU callbacks will be executed on the same
390	CPU that executed the corresponding call_rcu(), call_srcu(),
391	call_rcu_tasks(), or call_rcu_tasks_trace().  For example, if
392	a given CPU goes offline while having an RCU callback pending,
393	then that RCU callback will execute on some surviving CPU.
394	(If this was not the case, a self-spawning RCU callback would
395	prevent the victim CPU from ever going offline.)  Furthermore,
396	CPUs designated by rcu_nocbs= might well *always* have their
397	RCU callbacks executed on some other CPUs, in fact, for some
398	real-time workloads, this is the whole point of using the
399	rcu_nocbs= kernel boot parameter.
400
401	In addition, do not assume that callbacks queued in a given order
402	will be invoked in that order, even if they all are queued on the
403	same CPU.  Furthermore, do not assume that same-CPU callbacks will
404	be invoked serially.  For example, in recent kernels, CPUs can be
405	switched between offloaded and de-offloaded callback invocation,
406	and while a given CPU is undergoing such a switch, its callbacks
407	might be concurrently invoked by that CPU's softirq handler and
408	that CPU's rcuo kthread.  At such times, that CPU's callbacks
409	might be executed both concurrently and out of order.
410
41113.	Unlike most flavors of RCU, it *is* permissible to block in an
412	SRCU read-side critical section (demarked by srcu_read_lock()
413	and srcu_read_unlock()), hence the "SRCU": "sleepable RCU".
414	As with RCU, guard(srcu)() and scoped_guard(srcu) forms are
415	available, and often provide greater ease of use.  Please note
416	that if you don't need to sleep in read-side critical sections,
417	you should be using RCU rather than SRCU, because RCU is almost
418	always faster and easier to use than is SRCU.
419
420	Also unlike other forms of RCU, explicit initialization and
421	cleanup is required either at build time via DEFINE_SRCU()
422	or DEFINE_STATIC_SRCU() or at runtime via init_srcu_struct()
423	and cleanup_srcu_struct().  These last two are passed a
424	"struct srcu_struct" that defines the scope of a given
425	SRCU domain.  Once initialized, the srcu_struct is passed
426	to srcu_read_lock(), srcu_read_unlock() synchronize_srcu(),
427	synchronize_srcu_expedited(), and call_srcu().	A given
428	synchronize_srcu() waits only for SRCU read-side critical
429	sections governed by srcu_read_lock() and srcu_read_unlock()
430	calls that have been passed the same srcu_struct.  This property
431	is what makes sleeping read-side critical sections tolerable --
432	a given subsystem delays only its own updates, not those of other
433	subsystems using SRCU.	Therefore, SRCU is less prone to OOM the
434	system than RCU would be if RCU's read-side critical sections
435	were permitted to sleep.
436
437	The ability to sleep in read-side critical sections does not
438	come for free.	First, corresponding srcu_read_lock() and
439	srcu_read_unlock() calls must be passed the same srcu_struct.
440	Second, grace-period-detection overhead is amortized only
441	over those updates sharing a given srcu_struct, rather than
442	being globally amortized as they are for other forms of RCU.
443	Therefore, SRCU should be used in preference to rw_semaphore
444	only in extremely read-intensive situations, or in situations
445	requiring SRCU's read-side deadlock immunity or low read-side
446	realtime latency.  You should also consider percpu_rw_semaphore
447	when you need lightweight readers.
448
449	SRCU's expedited primitive (synchronize_srcu_expedited())
450	never sends IPIs to other CPUs, so it is easier on
451	real-time workloads than is synchronize_rcu_expedited().
452
453	It is also permissible to sleep in RCU Tasks Trace read-side
454	critical section, which are delimited by rcu_read_lock_trace()
455	and rcu_read_unlock_trace().  However, this is a specialized
456	flavor of RCU, and you should not use it without first checking
457	with its current users.  In most cases, you should instead
458	use SRCU.  As with RCU and SRCU, guard(rcu_tasks_trace)() and
459	scoped_guard(rcu_tasks_trace) are available, and often provide
460	greater ease of use.
461
462	Note that rcu_assign_pointer() relates to SRCU just as it does to
463	other forms of RCU, but instead of rcu_dereference() you should
464	use srcu_dereference() in order to avoid lockdep splats.
465
46614.	The whole point of call_rcu(), synchronize_rcu(), and friends
467	is to wait until all pre-existing readers have finished before
468	carrying out some otherwise-destructive operation.  It is
469	therefore critically important to *first* remove any path
470	that readers can follow that could be affected by the
471	destructive operation, and *only then* invoke call_rcu(),
472	synchronize_rcu(), or friends.
473
474	Because these primitives only wait for pre-existing readers, it
475	is the caller's responsibility to guarantee that any subsequent
476	readers will execute safely.
477
47815.	The various RCU read-side primitives do *not* necessarily contain
479	memory barriers.  You should therefore plan for the CPU
480	and the compiler to freely reorder code into and out of RCU
481	read-side critical sections.  It is the responsibility of the
482	RCU update-side primitives to deal with this.
483
484	For SRCU readers, you can use smp_mb__after_srcu_read_unlock()
485	immediately after an srcu_read_unlock() to get a full barrier.
486
48716.	Use CONFIG_PROVE_LOCKING, CONFIG_DEBUG_OBJECTS_RCU_HEAD, and the
488	__rcu sparse checks to validate your RCU code.	These can help
489	find problems as follows:
490
491	CONFIG_PROVE_LOCKING:
492		check that accesses to RCU-protected data structures
493		are carried out under the proper RCU read-side critical
494		section, while holding the right combination of locks,
495		or whatever other conditions are appropriate.
496
497	CONFIG_DEBUG_OBJECTS_RCU_HEAD:
498		check that you don't pass the same object to call_rcu()
499		(or friends) before an RCU grace period has elapsed
500		since the last time that you passed that same object to
501		call_rcu() (or friends).
502
503	CONFIG_RCU_STRICT_GRACE_PERIOD:
504		combine with KASAN to check for pointers leaked out
505		of RCU read-side critical sections.  This Kconfig
506		option is tough on both performance and scalability,
507		and so is limited to four-CPU systems.
508
509	__rcu sparse checks:
510		tag the pointer to the RCU-protected data structure
511		with __rcu, and sparse will warn you if you access that
512		pointer without the services of one of the variants
513		of rcu_dereference().
514
515	These debugging aids can help you find problems that are
516	otherwise extremely difficult to spot.
517
51817.	If you pass a callback function defined within a module
519	to one of call_rcu(), call_srcu(), call_rcu_tasks(), or
520	call_rcu_tasks_trace(), then it is necessary to wait for all
521	pending callbacks to be invoked before unloading that module.
522	Note that it is absolutely *not* sufficient to wait for a grace
523	period!  For example, synchronize_rcu() implementation is *not*
524	guaranteed to wait for callbacks registered on other CPUs via
525	call_rcu().  Or even on the current CPU if that CPU recently
526	went offline and came back online.
527
528	You instead need to use one of the barrier functions:
529
530	-	call_rcu() -> rcu_barrier()
531	-	call_srcu() -> srcu_barrier()
532	-	call_rcu_tasks() -> rcu_barrier_tasks()
533	-	call_rcu_tasks_trace() -> rcu_barrier_tasks_trace()
534
535	However, these barrier functions are absolutely *not* guaranteed
536	to wait for a grace period.  For example, if there are no
537	call_rcu() callbacks queued anywhere in the system, rcu_barrier()
538	can and will return immediately.
539
540	So if you need to wait for both a grace period and for all
541	pre-existing callbacks, you will need to invoke both functions,
542	with the pair depending on the flavor of RCU:
543
544	-	Either synchronize_rcu() or synchronize_rcu_expedited(),
545		together with rcu_barrier()
546	-	Either synchronize_srcu() or synchronize_srcu_expedited(),
547		together with and srcu_barrier()
548	-	synchronize_rcu_tasks() and rcu_barrier_tasks()
549	-	synchronize_tasks_trace() and rcu_barrier_tasks_trace()
550
551	If necessary, you can use something like workqueues to execute
552	the requisite pair of functions concurrently.
553
554	See rcubarrier.rst for more information.
555