ls: Fix excessive ls -al syscalls for ACL metadata #8841

kimono-koans · 2025-10-07T20:02:49Z

Reduces syscalls by searching for the specific ACL xattr key instead of requesting a list of all keys and values.

➜  ~ strace -c ./program/coreutils/target/release/ls -al
...
% time     seconds  usecs/call     calls    errors syscall
------ ----------- ----------- --------- --------- ------------------
 20.88    0.001559          11       130           listxattr
 16.02    0.001196          35        34           getdents64
 14.43    0.001077          13        79         9 statx
 10.89    0.000813         813         1           execve
  6.47    0.000483          17        28         1 openat
  4.65    0.000347          11        31           close
  4.21    0.000314          24        13           mmap
  4.07    0.000304          23        13           read
  3.99    0.000298          11        27           fstat
  3.03    0.000226          16        14         6 readlink
  1.81    0.000135          33         4         4 connect
  1.62    0.000121          30         4           socket
  1.25    0.000093          93         1           write
  1.11    0.000083          13         6           newfstatat
  0.90    0.000067          11         6           brk
  0.64    0.000048           6         7           rt_sigaction
  0.60    0.000045           9         5           mprotect
  0.58    0.000043           8         5           lseek
  0.58    0.000043           8         5           ioctl
  0.50    0.000037          18         2           munmap
  0.46    0.000034          17         2           pread64
  0.31    0.000023           7         3           sigaltstack
  0.25    0.000019          19         1         1 access
  0.15    0.000011           5         2           getrandom
  0.13    0.000010          10         1           arch_prctl
  0.11    0.000008           8         1           sched_getaffinity
  0.11    0.000008           8         1           set_tid_address
  0.11    0.000008           8         1           set_robust_list
  0.11    0.000008           8         1           rseq
  0.07    0.000005           2         2           prlimit64
  0.00    0.000000           0         1           poll
------ ----------- ----------- --------- --------- ------------------
100.00    0.007466          17       431        21 total

➜  ~ strace -c ./program/coreutils/target/release/ls -al
...
% time     seconds  usecs/call     calls    errors syscall
------ ----------- ----------- --------- --------- ------------------
 19.08    0.000962          28        34           getdents64
 17.12    0.000863          10        79         9 statx
 16.20    0.000817         817         1           execve
  8.67    0.000437          15        28         1 openat
  6.41    0.000323          24        13           mmap
  5.28    0.000266           4        66        66 getxattr
  4.20    0.000212           7        27           fstat
  4.17    0.000210          16        13           read
  3.91    0.000197           6        31           close
  3.35    0.000169          12        14         6 readlink
  2.42    0.000122          24         5           mprotect
  1.94    0.000098          16         6           brk
  1.21    0.000061           8         7           rt_sigaction
  1.03    0.000052          10         5           ioctl
  0.87    0.000044          22         2           munmap
  0.65    0.000033          16         2           pread64
  0.46    0.000023          11         2           getrandom
  0.42    0.000021           3         6           newfstatat
  0.38    0.000019           9         2           prlimit64
  0.36    0.000018          18         1         1 access
  0.36    0.000018           6         3           sigaltstack
  0.34    0.000017          17         1           poll
  0.34    0.000017           3         5           lseek
  0.22    0.000011          11         1           sched_getaffinity
  0.18    0.000009           9         1           arch_prctl
  0.16    0.000008           8         1           set_tid_address
  0.16    0.000008           8         1           rseq
  0.14    0.000007           7         1           set_robust_list
  0.00    0.000000           0         1           write
  0.00    0.000000           0         4           socket
  0.00    0.000000           0         4         4 connect
------ ----------- ----------- --------- --------- ------------------
100.00    0.005042          13       367        87 total

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

…er file has xattrs, solution: create two fns which test for acl, and for the set_cap xattr

Store xattr calls

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

This reverts commit 8adf358.

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

This reverts commit 37b6b96.

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

github-actions · 2025-10-07T20:45:59Z

GNU testsuite comparison:

Skip an intermittent issue tests/tail/overlay-headers (fails in this run but passes in the 'main' branch)
Note: The gnu test tests/ls/no-cap is now being skipped but was previously passing.

codspeed-hq · 2025-10-07T21:11:55Z

CodSpeed Performance Report

Merging #8841 will degrade performances by 2.91%

_{Comparing kimono-koans:reduce_syscalls_acls (20ceda7) with main (85a7812)}

🎉 Hooray! `codspeed-rust` just leveled up to 4.0.2!

A heads-up, this is a breaking change and it might affect your current performance baseline a bit. But here's the exciting part - it's packed with new, cool features and promises improved result stability 🥳!
Curious about what's new? Visit our releases page to delve into all the awesome details about this new version.

Summary

⚡ 3 improvements
❌ 4 regressions
✅ 99 untouched
⏩ 73 skipped¹

⚠️ Please fix the performance issues or acknowledge them on CodSpeed.

Benchmarks breakdown

	Benchmark	`BASE`	`HEAD`	Change
❌	`du_human_balanced_tree[(5, 4, 10)]`	10.1 ms	10.3 ms	-2.74%
❌	`ls_recursive_long_all_balanced_tree[(6, 4, 15)]`	138.5 ms	141.6 ms	-2.25%
❌	`ls_recursive_long_all_deep_tree[(100, 4)]`	3.1 ms	3.2 ms	-2.5%
⚡	`mv_force_overwrite`	123.8 ms	119 ms	+4.03%
⚡	`numfmt_padding[(10000, 50)]`	48.4 ms	47.1 ms	+2.6%
⚡	`sort_random_strings`	56.8 ms	55.3 ms	+2.74%
❌	`split_bytes`	482.6 µs	497 µs	-2.91%

73 benchmarks were skipped, so the baseline results were used instead. If they were deleted from the codebase, click here and archive them to remove them from the performance reports. ↩

kimono-koans · 2025-10-07T23:58:45Z

@sylvestre I think the CodSpeed tests have broken CICD. Can't understand why there would be an issue otherwise.

sylvestre · 2025-10-08T06:55:18Z

they wrote the following:
A heads-up, this is a breaking change and it might affect your current performance baseline a bit. But here's the exciting part - it's packed with new, cool features and promises improved result stability 🥳!
so, i guess it is expected

sylvestre · 2025-10-16T18:09:04Z

Cargo.toml

 walkdir = "2.5"
 winapi-util = "0.1.8"
 windows-sys = { version = "0.61.0", default-features = false }
 xattr = "1.3.1"


why lowering the number here ?

Because that's what's in master/incoming? Initially adopted newer version trying to overcome a conflict which is causes the tests below to fail?

github-actions · 2025-10-16T18:27:15Z

GNU testsuite comparison:

Skip an intermittent issue tests/misc/tee (fails in this run but passes in the 'main' branch)
Skip an intermittent issue tests/timeout/timeout (fails in this run but passes in the 'main' branch)
Skipping an intermittent issue tests/tail/overlay-headers (passes in this run but fails in the 'main' branch)
Note: The gnu test tests/ls/no-cap is now being skipped but was previously passing.

github-actions · 2025-10-17T23:31:31Z

GNU testsuite comparison:

Skip an intermittent issue tests/timeout/timeout (fails in this run but passes in the 'main' branch)
Skipping an intermittent issue tests/tail/overlay-headers (passes in this run but fails in the 'main' branch)
Note: The gnu test tests/ls/no-cap is now being skipped but was previously passing.

kimono-koans added 30 commits September 18, 2025 15:11

Initial commit

44efeaa

Merge branch 'uutils:main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

41fb8f9

Add default ACL

18ee2b8

Merge branch 'reduce_syscalls_acls' of https://github.com/kimono-koan…

95f5c05

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

Revert, do not count a default acl key as an ACL because GNU does not

80df9ee

Wrapped Result<Option<Vec<_>>> must be non-empty to indicate an ACL

6616412

Add back default ACL

d68298d

Cleanup

65f2b1f

Avoid 2nd syscall for non-directories

c5be794

Cleanup

22cf205

Fix buggy tests

9818dc0

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

cb75dac

Lazily obtain ACL, only really useful in LongFormat

ff6748e

Cleanup

59198d3

Cleanup

d80eb15

Cleanup

a97d3af

Fix broken test

d7271bf

Cleanup

c9a71e0

Cleanup

35e9ff8

Cleanup

59410bd

Fix GNU test for capabilities, fn has_acl previously tested for wheth…

5b0ede0

…er file has xattrs, solution: create two fns which test for acl, and for the set_cap xattr

Initial

f4e47ef

Merge pull request #56 from kimono-koans/store_xattrs

2b8dc11

Store xattr calls

Merge branch 'uutils:main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

d2db905

Fix spelling issue

e24f136

Cleanup

72b60f3

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

424e623

Fix lints

c479f8b

Merge branch 'reduce_syscalls_acls' of https://github.com/kimono-koan…

6c6f0e2

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

Fix lints

2d139bc

kimono-koans added 21 commits September 28, 2025 00:07

Revert "Fewer read_link calls"

b4b8321

This reverts commit 8adf358.

Fewer read_link calls

759f1e9

Reminder: Don't merge until we update a new version of xattr

a0011ea

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

15e8bd4

Bump xattr as 1.6.1 has updated logic which allows for fewer syscalls

77fc04e

Merge branch 'reduce_syscalls_acls' of https://github.com/kimono-koan…

d06d25f

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

Fix merge conflicts

82c83a6

Fix lints

c8bcda0

Cleanup

6de3265

Fix has_capability

d715b02

Fix Cargo.lock

9693255

Quicker has_acl processing

d893dc2

Fix broken deny.toml

37b6b96

Revert "Fix broken deny.toml"

6fb1f64

This reverts commit 37b6b96.

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

1699244

Better path resolution

b47e880

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

ac23f85

Update Cargo lock

64b7071

Merge branch 'reduce_syscalls_acls' of https://github.com/kimono-koan…

209b00e

…s/coreutils into reduce_syscalls_acls

Update cargo lock

fd1d298

Update deny.toml re: new and unneeded duplicates

446f61d

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

5ee74e2

sylvestre reviewed Oct 16, 2025

View reviewed changes

Merge branch 'main' into reduce_syscalls_acls

20ceda7

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ls: Fix excessive ls -al syscalls for ACL metadata #8841

ls: Fix excessive ls -al syscalls for ACL metadata #8841

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CodSpeed Performance Report

Merging #8841 will degrade performances by 2.91%

🎉 Hooray! codspeed-rust just leveled up to 4.0.2!

Summary

Benchmarks breakdown

Footnotes

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🎉 Hooray! `codspeed-rust` just leveled up to 4.0.2!