The documentation for seq_file suggests that it is necessary to be able
to move the iterator to a given offset, however that is not the case.
If the iterator is stored in the private data and is stable from one
read() syscall to the next, it is only necessary to support first/next
interactions.  Implementing this in a client is a little clumsy.

 - if ->start() is given a pos of zero, it should go to start of
   sequence.

 - if ->start() is given the name pos that was given to the most recent
   next() or start(), it should restore the iterator to state just
   before that last call

 - if ->start is given another number, it should set the iterator one
   beyond the start just before the last ->start or ->next call.

Also, the documentation says that the implementation can interpret the
pos however it likes (other than zero meaning start), but seq_file
increments the pos sometimes which does impose on the implementation.

This patch simplifies the interface for first/next iteration and
simplifies the code, while maintaining complete backward compatability.
Now:

 - if ->start() is given a pos of zero, it should return an iterator
   placed at the start of the sequence

 - if ->start() is given a non-zero pos, it should return the iterator
   in the same state it was after the last ->start or ->next.

This is particularly useful for interators which walk the multiple
chains in a hash table, e.g.  using rhashtable_walk*.  See
fs/gfs2/glock.c and drivers/staging/lustre/lustre/llite/vvp_dev.c

A large part of achieving this is to *always* call ->next after ->show
has successfully stored all of an entry in the buffer.  Never just
increment the index instead.  Also:

 - always pass &m->index to ->start() and ->next(), never a temp
   variable

 - don't clear ->from when ->count is zero, as ->from is dead when
   ->count is zero.

Some ->next functions do not increment *pos when they return NULL.  To
maintain compatability with this, we still need to increment m->index in
one place, if ->next didn't increment it.  Note that such ->next
functions are buggy and should be fixed.  A simple demonstration is

   dd if=/proc/swaps bs=1000 skip=1

Choose any block size larger than the size of /proc/swaps.  This will
always show the whole last line of /proc/swaps.

This patch doesn't work around buggy next() functions for this case.

[neilb@suse.com: ensure ->from is valid]
  Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/87601ryb8a.fsf@notabene.neil.brown.name


Signed-off-by: NeilBrown <neilb@suse.com>
Acked-by: Jonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>	[docs]
Tested-by: Jann Horn <jannh@google.com>
Cc: Alexander Viro <viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk>
Cc: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>