[PATCH] ARM: Add SWP/SWPB emulation for ARMv7 processors (v4)

[Catalin Marinas]

On Thu, 2010-01-28 at 14:52 +0000, Jamie Lokier wrote:
> Catalin Marinas wrote:
> > On Thu, 2010-01-14 at 13:07 +0000, Leif Lindholm wrote:
> > > The SWP instruction was deprecated in the ARMv6 architecture, superseded
> > > by the LDREX/STREX family of instructions for
> > > load-linked/store-conditional operations. The ARMv7 multiprocessing
> > > extensions mandate that SWP/SWPB instructions are treated as undefined
> > > from reset, with the ability to enable them through the System Control
> > > Register SW bit.
> > >
> > > This patch adds the alternative solution to emulate the SWP and SWPB
> > > instructions using LDREX/STREX sequences, and log statistics to
> > > /proc/cpu/swp_emulation. To correctly deal with copy-on-write, it also
> > > modifies cpu_v7_set_pte_ext to change the mappings to priviliged RO when
> > > user RO.
> >
> > Just a thought - could we not add another kuser helper in the vectors
> > page that does this? Your exception trapping code would set regs->ARM_lr
> > to the next instruction following SWP and regs->ARM_pc to the helper.
> 
> That would corrupt LR seen by userspace, wouldn't it?
> Userspace assumes SWP/SWPB do not change LR.

You are right, so not a good option.

-- 
Catalin