Re: [PATCH] efi: Return EFI_RESERVED_TYPE in efi_mem_type() for absent addresses

[Anshuman Khandual]

On 11/06/2019 10:31 PM, Ard Biesheuvel wrote:
> On Tue, 5 Nov 2019 at 21:39, Anshuman Khandual
> <anshuman.khandual@xxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> The function efi_mem_type() is expected (per documentation above) to return
>> EFI_RESERVED_TYPE when a given physical address is not present in the EFI
>> memory map. Even though EFI_RESERVED_TYPE is not getting checked explicitly
>> anywhere in the callers, it is always better to return expected values.
>>
>> Cc: Ard Biesheuvel <ard.biesheuvel@xxxxxxxxxx>
>> Cc: linux-efi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Cc: linux-kernel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Signed-off-by: Anshuman Khandual <anshuman.khandual@xxxxxxx>
> 
> This reverts commit f99afd08a45fbbd9ce35a7624ffd1d850a1906c0.
> 
> Could you explain why it is better to fix the code than fix the comment?

>From the above commit message, its not clear how returning EFI_RESERVED_TYPE
would have meant that a memory descriptor really exists.

Just wondering if firmware itself can send across memory descriptors with
EFI_RESERVED_TYPE attribute or it is only a software specific attribute ?
Currently it is being used while merging two adjacent regions with similar
type and attributes. Searching for physical addresses within those merged
memory descriptors will return EFI_RESERVED_TYPE but that is different than
the entry not being present at all. So I think the previous commit which
introduced -EINVAL/-ENOTSUPP in place for EFI_RESERVED_TYPE did the right
thing.

We should fix the comment instead, will send a patch.

> 
>> ---
>>  drivers/firmware/efi/efi.c | 2 +-
>>  1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
>>
>> diff --git a/drivers/firmware/efi/efi.c b/drivers/firmware/efi/efi.c
>> index 69f00f7453a3..bdda90a4601e 100644
>> --- a/drivers/firmware/efi/efi.c
>> +++ b/drivers/firmware/efi/efi.c
>> @@ -914,7 +914,7 @@ int efi_mem_type(unsigned long phys_addr)
>>                                   (md->num_pages << EFI_PAGE_SHIFT))))
>>                         return md->type;
>>         }
>> -       return -EINVAL;
>> +       return EFI_RESERVED_TYPE;
>>  }
>>  #endif
>>
>> --
>> 2.20.1
>>