Re: [PATCH v6 5/6] MCS Lock: Restructure the MCS lock defines and locking code into its own file

Waiman Long
2013-09-30T16:37:09Z

On 09/30/2013 12:10 PM, Jason Low wrote:
> On Mon, 2013-09-30 at 11:51 -0400, Waiman Long wrote:
>> On 09/28/2013 12:34 AM, Jason Low wrote:
>>>> Also, below is what the mcs_spin_lock() and mcs_spin_unlock()
>>>> functions would look like after applying the proposed changes.
>>>>
>>>> static noinline
>>>> void mcs_spin_lock(struct mcs_spin_node **lock, struct mcs_spin_node *node)
>>>> {
>>>> struct mcs_spin_node *prev;
>>>>
>>>> /* Init node */
>>>> node->locked = 0;
>>>> node->next = NULL;
>>>>
>>>> prev = xchg(lock, node);
>>>> if (likely(prev == NULL)) {
>>>> /* Lock acquired. No need to set node->locked since it
>>>> won't be used */
>>>> return;
>>>> }
>>>> ACCESS_ONCE(prev->next) = node;
>>>> /* Wait until the lock holder passes the lock down */
>>>> while (!ACCESS_ONCE(node->locked))
>>>> arch_mutex_cpu_relax();
>>>> smp_mb();
>> I wonder if a memory barrier is really needed here.
> If the compiler can reorder the while (!ACCESS_ONCE(node->locked)) check
> so that the check occurs after an instruction in the critical section,
> then the barrier may be necessary.
>

In that case, just a barrier() call should be enough.

-Longman