docs/memory-barriers.txt: Rewrite "KERNEL I/O BARRIER EFFECTS" section
The "KERNEL I/O BARRIER EFFECTS" section of memory-barriers.txt is vague, x86-centric, out-of-date, incomplete and demonstrably incorrect in places. This is largely because I/O ordering is a horrible can of worms, but also because the document has stagnated as our understanding has evolved. Attempt to address some of that, by rewriting the section based on recent(-ish) discussions with Arnd, BenH and others. Maybe one day we'll find a way to formalise this stuff, but for now let's at least try to make the English easier to understand. Cc: Benjamin Herrenschmidt <benh@kernel.crashing.org> Cc: Michael Ellerman <mpe@ellerman.id.au> Cc: Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de> Cc: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org> Cc: Andrea Parri <andrea.parri@amarulasolutions.com> Cc: Palmer Dabbelt <palmer@sifive.com> Cc: Daniel Lustig <dlustig@nvidia.com> Cc: David Howells <dhowells@redhat.com> Cc: Alan Stern <stern@rowland.harvard.edu> Cc: "Maciej W. Rozycki" <macro@linux-mips.org> Cc: Mikulas Patocka <mpatocka@redhat.com> Acked-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org> Reviewed-by: Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@linux.ibm.com> Signed-off-by: Will Deacon <will.deacon@arm.com>
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@ -2599,72 +2599,97 @@ likely, then interrupt-disabling locks should be used to guarantee ordering.
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KERNEL I/O BARRIER EFFECTS
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==========================
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When accessing I/O memory, drivers should use the appropriate accessor
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functions:
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(*) inX(), outX():
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These are intended to talk to I/O space rather than memory space, but
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that's primarily a CPU-specific concept. The i386 and x86_64 processors
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do indeed have special I/O space access cycles and instructions, but many
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CPUs don't have such a concept.
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The PCI bus, amongst others, defines an I/O space concept which - on such
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CPUs as i386 and x86_64 - readily maps to the CPU's concept of I/O
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space. However, it may also be mapped as a virtual I/O space in the CPU's
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memory map, particularly on those CPUs that don't support alternate I/O
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spaces.
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Accesses to this space may be fully synchronous (as on i386), but
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intermediary bridges (such as the PCI host bridge) may not fully honour
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that.
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They are guaranteed to be fully ordered with respect to each other.
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They are not guaranteed to be fully ordered with respect to other types of
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memory and I/O operation.
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Interfacing with peripherals via I/O accesses is deeply architecture and device
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specific. Therefore, drivers which are inherently non-portable may rely on
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specific behaviours of their target systems in order to achieve synchronization
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in the most lightweight manner possible. For drivers intending to be portable
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between multiple architectures and bus implementations, the kernel offers a
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series of accessor functions that provide various degrees of ordering
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guarantees:
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(*) readX(), writeX():
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Whether these are guaranteed to be fully ordered and uncombined with
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respect to each other on the issuing CPU depends on the characteristics
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defined for the memory window through which they're accessing. On later
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i386 architecture machines, for example, this is controlled by way of the
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MTRR registers.
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The readX() and writeX() MMIO accessors take a pointer to the peripheral
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being accessed as an __iomem * parameter. For pointers mapped with the
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default I/O attributes (e.g. those returned by ioremap()), then the
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ordering guarantees are as follows:
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Ordinarily, these will be guaranteed to be fully ordered and uncombined,
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provided they're not accessing a prefetchable device.
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1. All readX() and writeX() accesses to the same peripheral are ordered
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with respect to each other. For example, this ensures that MMIO register
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writes by the CPU to a particular device will arrive in program order.
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However, intermediary hardware (such as a PCI bridge) may indulge in
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deferral if it so wishes; to flush a store, a load from the same location
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is preferred[*], but a load from the same device or from configuration
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space should suffice for PCI.
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2. A writeX() by the CPU to the peripheral will first wait for the
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completion of all prior CPU writes to memory. For example, this ensures
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that writes by the CPU to an outbound DMA buffer allocated by
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dma_alloc_coherent() will be visible to a DMA engine when the CPU writes
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to its MMIO control register to trigger the transfer.
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[*] NOTE! attempting to load from the same location as was written to may
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cause a malfunction - consider the 16550 Rx/Tx serial registers for
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example.
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3. A readX() by the CPU from the peripheral will complete before any
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subsequent CPU reads from memory can begin. For example, this ensures
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that reads by the CPU from an incoming DMA buffer allocated by
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dma_alloc_coherent() will not see stale data after reading from the DMA
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engine's MMIO status register to establish that the DMA transfer has
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completed.
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Used with prefetchable I/O memory, an mmiowb() barrier may be required to
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force stores to be ordered.
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4. A readX() by the CPU from the peripheral will complete before any
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subsequent delay() loop can begin execution. For example, this ensures
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that two MMIO register writes by the CPU to a peripheral will arrive at
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least 1us apart if the first write is immediately read back with readX()
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and udelay(1) is called prior to the second writeX().
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Please refer to the PCI specification for more information on interactions
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between PCI transactions.
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__iomem pointers obtained with non-default attributes (e.g. those returned
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by ioremap_wc()) are unlikely to provide many of these guarantees.
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(*) readX_relaxed(), writeX_relaxed()
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(*) readX_relaxed(), writeX_relaxed():
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These are similar to readX() and writeX(), but provide weaker memory
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ordering guarantees. Specifically, they do not guarantee ordering with
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respect to normal memory accesses (e.g. DMA buffers) nor do they guarantee
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ordering with respect to LOCK or UNLOCK operations. If the latter is
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required, an mmiowb() barrier can be used. Note that relaxed accesses to
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the same peripheral are guaranteed to be ordered with respect to each
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other.
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ordering guarantees. Specifically, they do not guarantee ordering with
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respect to normal memory accesses or delay() loops (i.e bullets 2-4 above)
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but they are still guaranteed to be ordered with respect to other accesses
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to the same peripheral when operating on __iomem pointers mapped with the
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default I/O attributes.
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(*) readsX(), writesX():
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The readsX() and writesX() MMIO accessors are designed for accessing
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register-based, memory-mapped FIFOs residing on peripherals that are not
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capable of performing DMA. Consequently, they provide only the ordering
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guarantees of readX_relaxed() and writeX_relaxed(), as documented above.
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(*) inX(), outX():
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The inX() and outX() accessors are intended to access legacy port-mapped
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I/O peripherals, which may require special instructions on some
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architectures (notably x86). The port number of the peripheral being
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accessed is passed as an argument.
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Since many CPU architectures ultimately access these peripherals via an
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internal virtual memory mapping, the portable ordering guarantees provided
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by inX() and outX() are the same as those provided by readX() and writeX()
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respectively when accessing a mapping with the default I/O attributes.
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Device drivers may expect outX() to emit a non-posted write transaction
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that waits for a completion response from the I/O peripheral before
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returning. This is not guaranteed by all architectures and is therefore
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not part of the portable ordering semantics.
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(*) insX(), outsX():
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As above, the insX() and outsX() accessors provide the same ordering
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guarantees as readsX() and writesX() respectively when accessing a mapping
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with the default I/O attributes.
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(*) ioreadX(), iowriteX()
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These will perform appropriately for the type of access they're actually
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doing, be it inX()/outX() or readX()/writeX().
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All of these accessors assume that the underlying peripheral is little-endian,
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and will therefore perform byte-swapping operations on big-endian architectures.
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Composing I/O ordering barriers with SMP ordering barriers and LOCK/UNLOCK
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operations is a dangerous sport which may require the use of mmiowb(). See the
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subsection "Acquires vs I/O accesses" for more information.
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========================================
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ASSUMED MINIMUM EXECUTION ORDERING MODEL
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