From: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
To: Alan Stern <stern@rowland.harvard.edu>
Cc: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org>,
Will Deacon <will@kernel.org>,
"Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@kernel.org>,
Andrea Parri <parri.andrea@gmail.com>,
Boqun Feng <boqun.feng@gmail.com>,
Nick Piggin <npiggin@gmail.com>,
David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com>,
Jade Alglave <j.alglave@ucl.ac.uk>,
Luc Maranget <luc.maranget@inria.fr>,
Akira Yokosawa <akiyks@gmail.com>,
Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
linux-toolchains@vger.kernel.org,
linux-arch <linux-arch@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [RFC] LKMM: Add volatile_if()
Date: Fri, 4 Jun 2021 12:09:26 -0700 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <CAHk-=wiuLpmOGJyB385UyQioWMVKT6wN9UtyVXzt48AZittCKg@mail.gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20210604182708.GB1688170@rowland.harvard.edu>
On Fri, Jun 4, 2021 at 11:27 AM Alan Stern <stern@rowland.harvard.edu> wrote:
>
> volatile_if (READ_ONCE(*x) * 0 + READ_ONCE(*y))
> WRITE_ONCE(*z, 42);
>
> where there is no ordering between *x and *z.
I wouldn't worry about it.
I think a compiler is allowed to optimize away stupid code.
I get upset when a compiler says "oh, that's undefined, so I will
ignore the obvious meaning of it", but that's a different thing
entirely.
I really wish that the C standards group showed some spine, and said
"there is no undefined, there is only implementation-defined". That
would solve a *lot* of problems.
But I also realize that will never happen. Because "spine" and "good
taste" is not something that I've ever heard of happening in an
industry standards committee.
Side note: it is worth noting that my version of "volatile_if()" has
an added little quirk: it _ONLY_ orders the stuff inside the
if-statement.
I do think it's worth not adding new special cases (especially that
"asm goto" hack that will generate worse code than the compiler could
do), but it means that
x = READ_ONCE(ptr);
volatile_if (x > 0)
WRITE_ONCE(*z, 42);
has an ordering, but if you write it as
x = READ_ONCE(ptr);
volatile_if (x <= 0)
return;
WRITE_ONCE(*z, 42);
then I could in theory see teh compiler doing that WRITE_ONCE() as
some kind of non-control dependency.
That said, I don't actually see how the compiler could do anything
that actually broke the _semantics_ of the code. Yes, it could do the
write using a magical data dependency on the conditional and turning
it into a store on a conditional address instead (before doing the
branch), but honestly, I don't see how that would actually break
anything.
So this is more of a "in theory, the two sides are not symmetric". The
"asm volatile" in a barrier() will force the compiler to generate the
branch, and the memory clobber in barrier() will most certainly force
any stores inside the "volatile_if()" to be after the branch.
But because the memory clobber is only inside the if-statement true
case, the false case could have the compiler migrate any code in that
false thing to before the if.
Again, semantics do matter, and I don't see how the compiler could
actually break the fundamental issue of "load->conditional->store is a
fundamental ordering even without memory barriers because of basic
causality", because you can't just arbitrarily generate speculative
stores that would be visible to others.
But at the same time, that's *such* a fundamental rule that I really
am intrigued why people think "volatile_if()" is needed in reality (as
opposed to some "in theory, the compiler can know things that are
unknowable thanks to a magical oracle" BS argument)
Linus
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2021-06-04 19:11 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 127+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2021-06-04 10:12 [RFC] LKMM: Add volatile_if() Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 10:44 ` Will Deacon
2021-06-04 11:13 ` Will Deacon
2021-06-04 11:31 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 13:44 ` Will Deacon
2021-06-04 13:56 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 15:13 ` Will Deacon
2021-06-04 15:22 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 15:36 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-04 15:42 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 15:51 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-04 16:17 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 18:27 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-04 19:09 ` Linus Torvalds [this message]
2021-06-04 19:18 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-04 20:56 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-04 21:27 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-04 21:40 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-04 22:19 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-05 14:57 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 0:14 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-06 1:29 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 3:41 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 4:43 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-06 13:17 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 19:07 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-06 12:59 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 13:47 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 17:13 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 18:25 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 19:19 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 18:41 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 18:59 ` Jakub Jelinek
2021-06-06 19:15 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-06 19:22 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 20:11 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 21:19 ` Alexander Monakov
2021-06-06 22:38 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 23:39 ` Rasmus Villemoes
2021-06-06 23:44 ` Rasmus Villemoes
2021-06-07 8:01 ` Alexander Monakov
2021-06-07 8:27 ` Marco Elver
2021-06-07 15:28 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-07 17:04 ` Marco Elver
2021-06-08 9:30 ` Marco Elver
2021-06-08 11:22 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-08 15:28 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-09 12:44 ` Marco Elver
2021-06-09 15:31 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-09 16:13 ` Marco Elver
2021-06-09 17:14 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-09 17:31 ` Nick Desaulniers
2021-06-09 20:24 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-09 18:25 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-07 17:52 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-07 18:07 ` Alexander Monakov
2021-06-07 18:18 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-07 17:42 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-07 20:31 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-07 22:54 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 11:53 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 13:45 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 18:04 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 18:22 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 18:43 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-07 10:43 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-07 11:52 ` Will Deacon
2021-06-07 15:25 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-07 16:02 ` Will Deacon
2021-06-07 18:08 ` Paul E. McKenney
[not found] ` <20210730172020.GA32396@knuckles.cs.ucl.ac.uk>
2021-07-30 20:35 ` Alan Stern
2021-08-02 21:18 ` Alan Stern
2021-08-02 23:31 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-08-04 20:09 ` Alan Stern
2021-08-05 19:47 ` Alan Stern
2021-08-07 0:51 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-06 18:40 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 18:48 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 18:53 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 19:52 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 20:11 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-06 20:26 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 23:37 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-07 14:12 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-07 15:27 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-07 18:23 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-07 19:51 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-07 20:16 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-07 22:40 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-07 23:26 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-07 10:52 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-07 14:16 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 22:05 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-05 3:14 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-05 16:24 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-04 15:50 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 15:47 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 11:44 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 14:13 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-04 15:35 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 16:10 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 16:40 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 18:55 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-04 19:53 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 20:40 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-06 11:36 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-06 19:01 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-04 14:25 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-04 16:09 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 16:33 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 16:30 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-04 16:37 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 16:52 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 17:10 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-04 17:24 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 17:38 ` Linus Torvalds
2021-06-04 18:25 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-06-04 19:17 ` Peter Zijlstra
2021-06-04 20:43 ` Paul E. McKenney
2021-06-04 18:23 ` Alan Stern
2021-06-08 12:48 ` David Laight
2021-09-24 18:38 ` Mathieu Desnoyers
2021-09-24 19:52 ` Alan Stern
2021-09-24 20:22 ` Mathieu Desnoyers
2021-09-24 19:55 ` Segher Boessenkool
2021-09-24 20:39 ` Mathieu Desnoyers
2021-09-24 22:07 ` Mathieu Desnoyers
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