Re: [PATCH 02/10] mailbox: Enable BCM2835 mailbox support

Stephen Warren
2015-03-06T04:54:21Z

On 03/04/2015 11:20 AM, Eric Anholt wrote:
> Stephen Warren <swarren-3lzwWm7+Weoh9ZMKESR00Q@public.gmane.org> writes:
>
>> On 03/02/2015 01:54 PM, Eric Anholt wrote:
>>> From: Lubomir Rintel <lkundrak-NGH9Lh4a5iE@public.gmane.org>
>>>
>>> Implement BCM2835 mailbox support as a device registered with
>>> the general purpose mailbox framework. Implementation based on
>>> commits by Lubomir Rintel [1], Suman Anna and Jassi Brar [2] on
>>> which to base the implementation.
>>
>>> diff --git a/drivers/mailbox/bcm2835-mailbox.c
>>> b/drivers/mailbox/bcm2835-mailbox.c

>>> +static irqreturn_t bcm2835_mbox_irq(int irq, void *dev_id) +{
>>> + struct bcm2835_mbox *mbox = (struct bcm2835_mbox *) dev_id; +
>>> struct device *dev = mbox->dev; + + while (!(readl(mbox->regs +
>>> MAIL0_STA) & ARM_MS_EMPTY)) { + u32 msg = readl(mbox->regs +
>>> MAIL0_RD); + unsigned int chan = MBOX_CHAN(msg); + + if
>>> (!mbox->channel[chan].started) { + dev_err(dev, "Reply on
>>> stopped channel %d\n", chan); + continue; + } +
>>> dev_dbg(dev, "Reply 0x%08X\n", msg); +
>>> mbox_chan_received_data(mbox->channel[chan].link, + (void *)
>>> MBOX_DATA28(msg)); + } + rmb(); /* Finished last mailbox read.
>>> */
>>
>> I know the PDF mentioned in the comment earlier in the patch says
>> to put in barriers between accesses to different peripherals,
>> which this seems compliant with, but I don't see quite what this
>> barrier achieves. I think the PDF is talking generalities, not
>> imposing a rule that must be blindly followed. Besides, if
>> there's a context-switch you can't actually implement the rules
>> the PDF suggests. What read operation is this barrier attempting
>> to ensure happens after reading all mailbox messages and any
>> associated DRAM buffer?
>
> Looking at this bit of code in particular:
>
> "As interrupts can appear anywhere in the code so you should
> safeguard those. If an interrupt routine reads from a peripheral
> the routine should start with a memory read barrier. If an
> interrupt routine writes to a peripheral the routine should end
> with a memory write barrier."

I can see that doing that would be safe, but I don't think following
those rules is actually necessary in the general case. Following those
rules would cause lots of unnecessary barriers in code.

Barriers shouldn't be used arbitrarily at the start/end of ISRs, but
rather at specific chosen locations in the code that actually need to
enforce some kind of memory ordering.

For example, if the CPU writes a buffer to RAM, then programs a DMA
peripheral to read from that RAM buffer, you'd need to make sure the
RAM writes were visible to the DMA controller before kicking it off.
That's often achieved by wmb() between the last write to the memory
buffer (and perhaps some cache management) and the write to the DMA
controller to kick off the DMA read.

Not all ISRs will have any kind of interaction between DMA peripherals
and peripheral registers. For example, an I2C driver that only gets
data into/out-of the I2C controller HW via CPU PIO register
reads/writes rather than via DMA to/from RAM likely wouldn't ever need
any barriers.

> So it seems like the IRQ handler at least wants:
>
> diff --git a/drivers/mailbox/bcm2835-mailbox.c
> b/drivers/mailbox/bcm2835-mailbox.c index 604beb7..7e528f6 100644
> --- a/drivers/mailbox/bcm2835-mailbox.c +++
> b/drivers/mailbox/bcm2835-mailbox.c @@ -88,6 +88,13 @@ static
> irqreturn_t bcm2835_mbox_irq(int irq, void *dev_id) struct
> bcm2835_mbox *mbox = (struct bcm2835_mbox *) dev_id; struct device
> *dev = mbox->dev;
>
> + /* + * BCM2835-ARM-Peripherals.pdf says "If an interrupt
> routine + * reads from a peripheral the routine should start with
> a + * memory read barrier." + */ + rmb(); + while
> (!(readl(mbox->regs + MAIL0_STA) & ARM_MS_EMPTY)) { u32 msg =
> readl(mbox->regs + MAIL0_RD); unsigned int chan = MBOX_CHAN(msg);
> @@ -100,7 +107,6 @@ static irqreturn_t bcm2835_mbox_irq(int irq,
> void *dev_id) mbox_chan_received_data(mbox->channel[chan].link,
> (void *) MBOX_DATA28(msg)); } - rmb(); /* Finished last mailbox
> read. */ return IRQ_HANDLED; }

In this case, I don't think neither the original barrier is needed,
nor the extra one you added.