Re: [tip: objtool/urgent] objtool: Consolidate annotation macros

[Linus Torvalds]

On Wed, 3 Dec 2025 at 08:57, Ingo Molnar <mingo@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Find below a diff of the arch/x86/kernel/process.s output
> of your tree versus current tip:objtool/urgent.

Yeah, just a single example would have been sufficient, ie a simple

   Turn

        911:
               .pushsection .discard.annotate_insn,"M", @progbits, 8
               .long 911b - .
               .long 1
               .popsection
               jmp __x86_return_thunk

  Into

        911: .pushsection ".discard.annotate_insn", "M", @progbits, 8;
.long 911b - .; .long 1; .popsection
        jmp __x86_return_thunk

and btw, the quotes around the section name are not necessary afaik.

Also, I have to say that being mergeable is a bit annoying here:
without that, we could drop the "@progbits, 8" parts too which is just
strange noise.  Is the mergeability really a win? Because I'd assume
that it's never *actually* merged, since the expression "911b-." ends
up being a unique value?

What am I missing? It *feels* like this should just all be

        911: .pushsection .discard.annotate_insn ; .long 911b - .;
.long 1; .popsection
        jmp __x86_return_thunk

instead. But it's entirely possible I'm not seeing the reason here...

                 Linus