Re: [PATCH v7 05/10] rust: io: add IoLoc and IoWrite types

[Alexandre Courbot]

On Thu Mar 5, 2026 at 7:19 AM JST, Gary Guo wrote:
> On Tue Feb 24, 2026 at 2:21 PM GMT, Alexandre Courbot wrote:
>> I/O accesses are defined by the following properties:
>>
>> - For reads, a start address, a width, and a type to interpret the read
>>   value as,
>> - For writes, the same as above, and a value to write.
>>
>> Introduce the `IoLoc` trait, which allows implementing types to specify
>> the address a type expects to be accessed at, as well as the width of
>> the access, and the user-facing type used to perform the access.
>>
>> This allows read operations to be made generic with the `read` method
>> over an `IoLoc` argument.
>>
>> Write operations need a value to write on top of the `IoLoc`: fulfill
>> that purpose with the `IoWrite` type, which is the combination of an
>> `IoLoc` and a value of the type it expects. This allows write operations
>> to be made generic with the `write` method over a single `IoWrite`
>> argument.
>>
>> The main purpose of these new entities is to allow register types to be
>> written using these generic `read` and `write` methods of `Io`.
>>
>> Co-developed-by: Gary Guo <gary@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>> Signed-off-by: Alexandre Courbot <acourbot@xxxxxxxxxx>
>> ---
>>  rust/kernel/io.rs | 241 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
>>  1 file changed, 241 insertions(+)
>>
>> diff --git a/rust/kernel/io.rs b/rust/kernel/io.rs
>> index b150743ffa4f..fdd2549d8e13 100644
>> --- a/rust/kernel/io.rs
>> +++ b/rust/kernel/io.rs
>> @@ -173,6 +173,158 @@ pub trait IoCapable<T> {
>>      unsafe fn io_write(&self, value: T, address: usize);
>>  }
>>  
>> +/// Describes a given I/O location: its offset, width, and return type.
>> +///
>> +/// This trait is the key abstraction allowing [`Io::read`], [`Io::write`], and [`Io::update`]
>> +/// to work uniformly with both raw `usize` offsets (for primitive types like `u32`) and typed
>> +/// ones.
>> +///
>> +/// An `IoLoc<T>` carries three pieces of information:
>> +///
>> +/// - The offset to access (returned by [`IoLoc::offset`]),
>> +/// - The width of the access (determined by [`IoLoc::IoType`]),
>> +/// - The type `T` in which data is returned or provided.
>> +///
>> +/// `T` and `IoType` may differ: for instance, a typed register has `T` = the register type with
>> +/// its bitfields, and `IoType` = its backing primitive (e.g. `u32`), with `Into` conversions
>> +/// between them.
>> +///
>> +/// An `IoLoc` can be passed directly to [`Io::read`] or [`Io::try_read`] to obtain a value, or
>> +/// turned into an [`IoWrite`] via [`IoLoc::set`] to be passed to [`Io::write`] or
>> +/// [`Io::try_write`].
>> +pub trait IoLoc<T>: Copy
>> +where
>> +    T: Into<Self::IoType>,
>> +    Self::IoType: Into<T>,
>> +{
>> +    /// Size (`u8`, `u16`, etc) of the I/O performed on the returned [`offset`](IoLoc::offset).
>> +    type IoType;
>
> You should move the where bound on the trait type to here.
>
> A where bound on the trait is something that needs to be proved when referencing
> the trait, rather than something that can be assumed (which is the case for
> bounds in assoc types), which is why you need the extra `Into` bounds on `Io`
> functions.

Thanks, this indeed looks better. I remember Alice mentioned that we
should prefer `Into` for trait bounds [1] so I don't think we can port
her comment here, but I agree these constraints are things that we should
be able to assume.

[1] https://lore.kernel.org/all/aZlwG3wK5w-IV18x@xxxxxxxxxx/