nfsdcltrack(8) — Linux manual page

NAME \| SYNOPSIS \| DESCRIPTION \| OPTIONS \| COMMANDS \| EXTERNAL CONFIGURATION \| LEGACY TRANSITION MECHANISM \| NOTES \| AUTHORS \| COLOPHON

NFSDCLTRACK(8)                                             NFSDCLTRACK(8)

NAME top

       nfsdcltrack - NFSv4 Client Tracking Callout Program

SYNOPSIS top

       nfsdcltrack [-d] [-f] [-s stable storage dir] <command> <args...>

DESCRIPTION top

       nfsdcltrack is the NFSv4 client tracking callout program. It is
       not necessary to install this program on machines that are not
       acting as NFSv4 servers.

       When a network partition is combined with a server reboot, there
       are edge conditions that can cause the server to grant lock
       reclaims when other clients have taken conflicting locks in the
       interim. A more detailed explanation of this issue is described in
       RFC 3530, section 8.6.3 and in RFC 5661, section 8.4.3.

       In order to prevent these problems, the server must track a small
       amount of per-client information on stable storage. This program
       provides the userspace piece of that functionality. When the
       kernel needs to manipulate the database that stores this info, it
       will execute this program to handle it.

OPTIONS top

       -d, --debug
           Enable debug level logging.

       -f, --foreground
           Log to stderr instead of syslog.

       -s storagedir, --storagedir=storage_dir
           Directory where stable storage information should be kept. The
           default value is /var/lib/nfs/nfsdcltrack.

COMMANDS top

       nfsdcltrack requires a command for each invocation. Supported
       commands are:

       init
           Initialize the database. This command requires no argument.

       create
           Create a new client record (or update the timestamp on an
           existing one). This command requires a hex-encoded
           nfs_client_id4 as an argument.

       remove
           Remove a client record from the database. This command
           requires a hex-encoded nfs_client_id4 as an argument.

       check
           Check to see if a nfs_client_id4 is allowed to reclaim. This
           command requires a hex-encoded nfs_client_id4 as an argument.

       gracedone
           Remove any unreclaimed client records from the database. This
           command requires a epoch boot time as an argument.

EXTERNAL CONFIGURATION top

       The directory for stable storage information can be set via the
       file /etc/nfs.conf by setting the storagedir value in the
       nfsdcltrack section.  For example:
            [nfsdcltrack]
              storagedir = /shared/nfs/nfsdcltrack
       Debugging to syslog can also be enabled by setting "debug = 1" in
       this file.

LEGACY TRANSITION MECHANISM top

       The Linux kernel NFSv4 server has historically tracked this
       information on stable storage by manipulating information on the
       filesystem directly, in the directory to which
       /proc/fs/nfsd/nfsv4recoverydir points. If the kernel passes the
       correct information, then nfsdcltrack can use it to allow a
       seamless transition from the old client tracking scheme to the new
       one.

       On a check operation, if there is no record of the client in the
       database, nfsdcltrack will look to see if the
       NFSDCLTRACK_LEGACY_RECDIR environment variable is set. If it is,
       then it will fetch that value and see if a directory exists by
       that name. If it does, then the check operation will succeed and
       the directory will be removed.

       On a gracedone operation, nfsdcltrack will look to see if the
       NFSDCLTRACK_LEGACY_TOPDIR environment variable is set. If it is,
       then it will attempt to clean out that directory prior to exiting.

       Note that this transition is one-way. If the machine subsequently
       reboots back into an older kernel that does not support the
       nfsdcltrack upcall then the clients will not be able to recover
       their state.

NOTES top

       This program requires a kernel that supports the nfsdcltrack
       usermodehelper upcall. This support was first added to mainline
       kernels in 3.8.

AUTHORS top

       nfsdcltrack was developed by Jeff Layton <[email protected]>.

COLOPHON top

       This page is part of the nfs-utils (NFS utilities) project.
       Information about the project can be found at 
       ⟨http://linux-nfs.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page⟩.  If you have a bug
       report for this manual page, see
       ⟨http://linux-nfs.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page⟩.  This page was
       obtained from the project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨git://git.linux-nfs.org/projects/steved/nfs-utils.git⟩ on
       2025-08-11.  (At that time, the date of the most recent commit
       that was found in the repository was 2025-06-27.)  If you discover
       any rendering problems in this HTML version of the page, or you
       believe there is a better or more up-to-date source for the page,
       or you have corrections or improvements to the information in this
       COLOPHON (which is not part of the original manual page), send a
       mail to [email protected]

                                2012-10-24                 NFSDCLTRACK(8)

Pages that refer to this page: nfsdcld(8)