Re: [patch] SMP alternatives

[Andi Kleen]

On Wed, Nov 23, 2005 at 04:42:13PM +0000, Alan Cox wrote:
> On Mer, 2005-11-23 at 12:17 -0700, Andi Kleen wrote:
> > > +	/* Paranoia */
> > > +	asm volatile ("jmp 1f\n1:");
> > > +	mb();
> > 
> > That would be totally obsolete 386 era paranoia. If anything then use 
> > a CLFLUSH (but not available on all x86s) 
> 
> If you are patching code another x86 CPU is running you must halt the
> other processors and ensure it executes a serialzing instruction before
> it enters any patched code. 

Yes that is why the original alternative() mechanism always only
runs before the code is ever executed.

> How many kilobytes of tables do you add to the kernel to do this
> pointless stunt btw ?

I much prefer the MSR bit too. Unfortunately it doesn't exist
(or rather I bet it exists somewhere, just undocumented) on Intel 
systems.

-Andi
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