[PATCH v2 14/16] bitfield: Add comment block for the host/fixed endian functions

david.laight.linux
2025-12-12T19:38:16Z

From: David Laight <david.laight.linux@gmail.com>

Copied almost verbatim from the commit message that added the functions.

Signed-off-by: David Laight <david.laight.linux@gmail.com>
---
include/linux/bitfield.h | 43 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
1 file changed, 43 insertions(+)

diff --git a/include/linux/bitfield.h b/include/linux/bitfield.h
index 03206be4ab54..3bf82121a282 100644
--- a/include/linux/bitfield.h
+++ b/include/linux/bitfield.h
@@ -181,6 +181,49 @@ do { \
*_reg_p = (*_reg_p & ~_mask) | ((_val << __bf_shf(_mask)) & _mask); \
})

+/*
+ * Primitives for manipulating bitfields both in host- and fixed-endian.
+ *
+ * * u32 le32_get_bits(__le32 val, u32 field) extracts the contents of the
+ * bitfield specified by @field in little-endian 32bit object @val and
+ * converts it to host-endian.
+ *
+ * * void le32p_replace_bits(__le32 *p, u32 v, u32 field) replaces
+ * the contents of the bitfield specified by @field in little-endian
+ * 32bit object pointed to by @p with the value of @v. New value is
+ * given in host-endian and stored as little-endian.
+ *
+ * * __le32 le32_replace_bits(__le32 old, u32 v, u32 field) is equivalent to
+ * ({__le32 tmp = old; le32p_replace_bits(&tmp, v, field); tmp;})
+ * In other words, instead of modifying an object in memory, it takes
+ * the initial value and returns the modified one.
+ *
+ * * __le32 le32_encode_bits(u32 v, u32 field) is equivalent to
+ * le32_replace_bits(0, v, field). In other words, it returns a little-endian
+ * 32bit object with the bitfield specified by @field containing the
+ * value of @v and all bits outside that bitfield being zero.
+ *
+ * Such set of helpers is defined for each of little-, big- and host-endian
+ * types; e.g. u64_get_bits(val, field) will return the contents of the bitfield
+ * specified by @field in host-endian 64bit object @val, etc. Of course, for
+ * host-endian no conversion is involved.
+ *
+ * Fields to access are specified as GENMASK() values - an N-bit field
+ * starting at bit #M is encoded as GENMASK(M + N - 1, M). Note that
+ * bit numbers refer to endianness of the object we are working with -
+ * e.g. GENMASK(11, 0) in __be16 refers to the second byte and the lower
+ * 4 bits of the first byte. In __le16 it would refer to the first byte
+ * and the lower 4 bits of the second byte, etc.
+ *
+ * Field specification must be a constant; __builtin_constant_p() doesn't
+ * have to be true for it, but compiler must be able to evaluate it at
+ * build time. If it cannot or if the value does not encode any bitfield,
+ * the build will fail.
+ *
+ * If the value being stored in a bitfield is a constant that does not fit
+ * into that bitfield, a warning will be generated at compile time.
+ */
+
extern void __compiletime_error("value doesn't fit into mask")
__field_overflow(void);
extern void __compiletime_error("bad bitfield mask")
--
2.39.5