[FLUME-3308] TailDirSource will write an empty position json file

• Type: Bug
• Status: Open
• Priority: Critical
• Resolution: Unresolved
• Affects Version/s: 1.8.0
• Component/s: Sinks+Sources

Environment

Flume 1.8, TailDirSource

• Assignee: Unassigned
• Reporter: Xingxing Di
• Created: 26/Dec/18 04:59
• Updated: 23/Dec/19 02:13

Description

We found TailDirSource has a critical issue  while writing position json file:

1.In the "process" method, existingInodes.clear() then  existingInodes.addAll() is not  safe, in positionWriter thread will read an empty existingInodes  with no lock ( just after clear() executed and addAll() method not called yet), this will cause an empty json string.

2.The FileWriter is not atomic, the position json file is over 5M in our case(which is big), after we fix the above issue, we still read an empty position json file occasionally.

If flume was restarted and read an empty position json file, flume will tail all files from begining, which is critical!

So we make a little change : 

1. Add lock for existingInodes list,  and in positionWriter thread  we make a copy of existingInodes everytime.
2. We replace FileWriter with an AtomicFileWriter.

Later i will make a PR to share this.

 

Issue Links

• links to: GitHub Pull Request #312