RE: Buggy commit tracked to: "Re: [PATCH 2/9] iov_iter: move rw_copy_check_uvector() into lib/iov_iter.c"

David Laight
2020-10-24T21:12:17Z

From: Segher Boessenkool
> Sent: 24 October 2020 18:29
>
> On Fri, Oct 23, 2020 at 09:28:59PM +0000, David Laight wrote:
> > From: Segher Boessenkool
> > > Sent: 23 October 2020 19:27
> > > On Fri, Oct 23, 2020 at 06:58:57PM +0100, Al Viro wrote:
> > > > On Fri, Oct 23, 2020 at 03:09:30PM +0200, David Hildenbrand wrote:
> > > > On arm64 when callee expects a 32bit argument, the caller is *not* responsible
> > > > for clearing the upper half of 64bit register used to pass the value - it only
> > > > needs to store the actual value into the lower half. The callee must consider
> > > > the contents of the upper half of that register as undefined. See AAPCS64 (e.g.
> > > > https://github.com/ARM-software/abi-aa/blob/master/aapcs64/aapcs64.rst#parameter-passing-rules
> > > > ); AFAICS, the relevant bit is
> > > > "Unlike in the 32-bit AAPCS, named integral values must be narrowed by
> > > > the callee rather than the caller."
> > >
> > > Or the formal rule:
> > >
> > > C.9 If the argument is an Integral or Pointer Type, the size of the
> > > argument is less than or equal to 8 bytes and the NGRN is less
> > > than 8, the argument is copied to the least significant bits in
> > > x[NGRN]. The NGRN is incremented by one. The argument has now
> > > been allocated.
> >
> > So, in essence, if the value is in a 64bit register the calling
> > code is independent of the actual type of the formal parameter.
> > Clearly a value might need explicit widening.
>
> No, this says that if you pass a 32-bit integer in a 64-bit register,
> then the top 32 bits of that register hold an undefined value.

That's sort of what I meant.
The 'normal' junk in the hight bits will there because the variable
in the calling code is wider.

> > I've found a copy of the 64 bit arm instruction set.
> > Unfortunately it is alpha sorted and repetitive so shows none
> > of the symmetry and makes things difficult to find.
>
> All of this is ABI, not ISA. Look at the AAPCS64 pointed to above.
>
> > But, contrary to what someone suggested most register writes
> > (eg from arithmetic) seem to zero/extend the high bits.
>
> Everything that writes a "w" does, yes. But that has nothing to do with
> the parameter passing rules, that is ABI. It just means that very often
> a 32-bit integer will be passed zero-extended in a 64-bit register, but
> that is just luck (or not, it makes finding bugs harder ;-) )

Working out why the code is wrong is more of an ISA issue than an ABI one.
It may be an ABI one, but the analysis is ISA.

I've written a lot of asm over the years - decoding compiler generated
asm isn't that hard.
At least ARM doesn't have annulled delay slots.

David

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