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Date: Mon, 5 Mar 2007 14:04:24 -0800
From: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
To: Andi Kleen <ak@suse.de>
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers <compudj@google.com>,
       "Martin J. Bligh" <mbligh@google.com>, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
       "David S. Miller" <davem@davemloft.net>,
       Paul Mackerras <paulus@samba.org>, "Luck, Tony" <tony.luck@intel.com>,
       Haavard Skinnemoen <hskinnemoen@atmel.com>
Subject: Re: Thread flags modified without set_thread_flag() (non
 atomically)
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On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 15:40:33 +0100
Andi Kleen <ak@suse.de> wrote:

> > It does seem risky.  Perhaps it is a micro-optimisation which utilises
> > knowledge that this thread_struct cannot be looked up via any path in this
> > context.
> > 
> > Or perhaps it is a bug.  Andi, can you please comment?
> 
> On flush_thread nobody else can mess with the thread,

What about resched_task()?

> so yes it's a micro
> optimization.
> 
> > 
> > > And about this specific flush_thread, I am puzzled about the t->flags ^= 
> > > (_TIF_ABI_PENDING | _TIF_IA32); line. The XOR will clearly flip the 
> > > _TIF_ABI_PENDING bit to 0, and very likely set _TIF_IA32 to the opposite 
> > > of its current value. Why does this change need to be written atomically 
> > > (can other threads play with these flags ?) ?
> > > 
> > 
> > Don't know.
> 
> iirc it came from DaveM originally. He just likes to write things in 
> comp^wclever ways :0) It's just a little shorter.
> 
> > No, I don't immediately see anything in the flush_old_exec() code path
> > which tells us that nobody else can look up this thread_info (or be holding
> > a ref to it) in this context.
> 
> Normally the process flags atomicity should only matter with signals;

Thread flags.  yes, most of them are synchronously set by their owner, but
not all, I think.


> i don't think you can send a signal to a process being in exec this way.
> 
> -Andi