RFC: Adding a UF_DONTCACHE flag

Rick Macklem <[email protected]> Thu, 9 Jul 2026 17:54:53 -0700
Newsgroups gmane.os.freebsd.devel.file-systems
Message-ID <CAM5tNy5f43sW7s=Lo07x=+km_t7oTKqgH0CsKY7v-aoFWUJjYQ@mail.gmail.com>
Hi,

This internet draft (which is close to being an RFC)
specifies a new NFSv4.2 attribute which tells the NFSv4.2
client to not cache file data. (Similar to O_DIRECT, but
triggered by this attribute set on the file on the NFSv4.2
server and not by the application's open(2).)

https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-nfsv4-uncacheable-files/

I am thinking that this can be implemented as a
new UF_xxx va_flags bit. I called it UF_DONTCACHE,
but anyone can suggest a better name.
(The alternative would be to define an extended attribute,
but that involves extra overhead, since GETATTR will probably
ask for it for every file when open'd on a client.)

Does this sound reasonable or is there a better approach?

Thanks in advance for any comments, rick
ps: I don't know if this flag would be useful for other types
      of file systems?