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authorYunhong Jiang <yunhong.jiang@intel.com>2015-08-04 12:17:53 -0700
committerYunhong Jiang <yunhong.jiang@intel.com>2015-08-04 15:44:42 -0700
commit9ca8dbcc65cfc63d6f5ef3312a33184e1d726e00 (patch)
tree1c9cafbcd35f783a87880a10f85d1a060db1a563 /kernel/Documentation/io_ordering.txt
parent98260f3884f4a202f9ca5eabed40b1354c489b29 (diff)
Add the rt linux 4.1.3-rt3 as base
Import the rt linux 4.1.3-rt3 as OPNFV kvm base. It's from git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/rt/linux-rt-devel.git linux-4.1.y-rt and the base is: commit 0917f823c59692d751951bf5ea699a2d1e2f26a2 Author: Sebastian Andrzej Siewior <bigeasy@linutronix.de> Date: Sat Jul 25 12:13:34 2015 +0200 Prepare v4.1.3-rt3 Signed-off-by: Sebastian Andrzej Siewior <bigeasy@linutronix.de> We lose all the git history this way and it's not good. We should apply another opnfv project repo in future. Change-Id: I87543d81c9df70d99c5001fbdf646b202c19f423 Signed-off-by: Yunhong Jiang <yunhong.jiang@intel.com>
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+On some platforms, so-called memory-mapped I/O is weakly ordered. On such
+platforms, driver writers are responsible for ensuring that I/O writes to
+memory-mapped addresses on their device arrive in the order intended. This is
+typically done by reading a 'safe' device or bridge register, causing the I/O
+chipset to flush pending writes to the device before any reads are posted. A
+driver would usually use this technique immediately prior to the exit of a
+critical section of code protected by spinlocks. This would ensure that
+subsequent writes to I/O space arrived only after all prior writes (much like a
+memory barrier op, mb(), only with respect to I/O).
+
+A more concrete example from a hypothetical device driver:
+
+ ...
+CPU A: spin_lock_irqsave(&dev_lock, flags)
+CPU A: val = readl(my_status);
+CPU A: ...
+CPU A: writel(newval, ring_ptr);
+CPU A: spin_unlock_irqrestore(&dev_lock, flags)
+ ...
+CPU B: spin_lock_irqsave(&dev_lock, flags)
+CPU B: val = readl(my_status);
+CPU B: ...
+CPU B: writel(newval2, ring_ptr);
+CPU B: spin_unlock_irqrestore(&dev_lock, flags)
+ ...
+
+In the case above, the device may receive newval2 before it receives newval,
+which could cause problems. Fixing it is easy enough though:
+
+ ...
+CPU A: spin_lock_irqsave(&dev_lock, flags)
+CPU A: val = readl(my_status);
+CPU A: ...
+CPU A: writel(newval, ring_ptr);
+CPU A: (void)readl(safe_register); /* maybe a config register? */
+CPU A: spin_unlock_irqrestore(&dev_lock, flags)
+ ...
+CPU B: spin_lock_irqsave(&dev_lock, flags)
+CPU B: val = readl(my_status);
+CPU B: ...
+CPU B: writel(newval2, ring_ptr);
+CPU B: (void)readl(safe_register); /* maybe a config register? */
+CPU B: spin_unlock_irqrestore(&dev_lock, flags)
+
+Here, the reads from safe_register will cause the I/O chipset to flush any
+pending writes before actually posting the read to the chipset, preventing
+possible data corruption.