nfs: task 39340 can't get a request slot

Jonathan Corbet (corbet-lk@eklektix.com)
Wed, 29 Dec 1999 09:01:03 -0700

Running 2.3.34, I occasionally get into a situation where processes appear
to just hang (the dreaded "D" wait), and the system logs a small number of
messages like:

Dec 29 08:43:03 montalcino kernel: nfs: task 39340 can't get a request slot
Dec 29 08:43:03 montalcino kernel: nfs: task 39342 can't get a request slot
Dec 29 08:43:23 montalcino kernel: nfs: task 40394 can't get a request slot

The problem seems to come from the NFS client code - it is almost always
caused by some sort of NFS-intensive activity - a big rgrep, or running tar
to unpack a remote tarball. The system gets increasingly unusable,
rebooting tends to be the order of the day.

I've seen the problem with earlier 2.3.3x kernels; before then I wasn't
running development kernels for a while, so I can't say just when the
problem showed up.

For what it's worth, the NFS server being used is running 2.0.36.

Anybody have any ideas? Fixes, or suggestions on how to better track down
the problem?

Thanks,

jon

Jonathan Corbet, Eklektix, Inc.
corbet@eklektix.com

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