Re: kobject.c changes in -mm

[Greg KH <gregkh@suse.de>]

On Mon, Jan 08, 2007 at 01:37:47PM +0000, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> --- linux-2.6.20-rc3/lib/kobject.c      2007-01-01 23:04:49.000000000 -0800
> +++ devel/lib/kobject.c 2007-01-04 21:13:21.000000000 -0800
> @@ -15,6 +15,8 @@
>  #include <linux/module.h>
>  #include <linux/stat.h>
>  #include <linux/slab.h>
> +#include <linux/kallsyms.h>
> +#include <asm-generic/sections.h>
> 
> +#ifdef CONFIG_X86_32
> +static int ptr_in_range(void *ptr, void *start, void *end)
> +{
> +       /*
> +        * This should hopefully get rid of causing warnings
> +        * if the architecture did not set one of the section
> +        * variables up.
> +        */ 
> +       if (start >= end)
> +               return 0;
> +
> +       if ((ptr >= start) && (ptr < end))
> +               return 1;
> +       return 0;
> +}      
> 
> 
> Can anyone explain WTF is going on here?  Including asm-generic headers
> in core code definitly is not okay.  As are random CONFIG_X86_32 ifdefs
> in said code.

It's a hack for debugging.  See the full patch at:
	http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/gregkh/gregkh-2.6/patches/driver/warn-when-statically-allocated-kobjects-are-used.patch

It is never going to go to mainline, due to the arch-specific hacks as
you have noted.  But is good to have for debugging and getting error
reports from users of -mm.

thanks,

greg k-h