> > Am I reading this correctly--the address of the main() function for a
> > process is guaranteed to be the lowest possible virtual address?
> >
> > chris
> >
>
> It is one of the lowest. The 'C' runtime library puts section
> .text (the code) first, then .data, then .bss, then .stack. The
> .stack section is co-located with the heap which can be extended
> by setting a new break address.
>
> When a process is created, the lowest address is the entry point of
> crt0.o _init. We can see where that is by:
>
> Script started on Thu Oct 12 14:25:35 2000
> # cat xxx.c
>
> extern int _init();
> main()
> {
> printf("_init is at %p\n", _init);
> }
>
> # gcc -o xxx xxx.c
> # ./xxx
> _init is at 0x804838c
> # exit
> exit
> Script done on Thu Oct 12 14:25:51 2000
>
> That said, remember that in Unix, the 'C' rutime library exists in the
> lower portion of the .text section. So your code's virtual address space
> starts above that address space. This is MMAPed so everybody gets
> to share the same pages. In this way, you don't all have to keep a
> private copy of the 'C' runtime library.
User-process virtual addresses have no direct relation to physical
addresses, right? So why does the process space start at such a high virtual
address (why not closer to 0x00000000)? Seems we're wasting ~128 megs of
RAM. Not a huge amount compared to 4G, but signifigant. Is that space used
(libc can't be that big!) or reserved somehow?
Another question: how (and where in the code) do we translate virtual
user-addresses to physical addresses? Does the MMU do it, or does it call a
kernel handler function? Why is the kernel allowed to reference physical
addresses, while user processes go through the translation step? Can kernel
pages be swapped out / faulted in just like user process pages?
Sorry to pounce on you with all of these questions. I've read up on this
stuff but can't always find answers...
thanks--
chris
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