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authorPragat Pandya <pragat.pandya@gmail.com>2020-03-03 10:33:01 +0530
committerJonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>2020-03-10 11:33:19 -0600
commitd1ce350015d86a67d245fad124e37d14b573cac2 (patch)
tree471690b4a383b3bc82eeab65db4f9bf6aeea8943 /Documentation/io_ordering.txt
parentDocumentation: Add io-mapping.rst to driver-api manual (diff)
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Documentation: Add io_ordering.rst to driver-api manual
Add io_ordering.rst under Documentation/driver-api and reference it from the Sphinx TOC Tree present in Documentation/driver-api/index.rst Signed-off-by: Pragat Pandya <pragat.pandya@gmail.com> Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20200303050301.5412-3-pragat.pandya@gmail.com Signed-off-by: Jonathan Corbet <corbet@lwn.net>
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-==============================================
-Ordering I/O writes to memory-mapped addresses
-==============================================
-
-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.