Re: [PATCH RFC 00/11] mm: distinguish PTE table storage from PTE values

[Alexander Gordeev]

On Tue, Jul 28, 2026 at 09:26:06PM +0200, David Hildenbrand (Arm) wrote:
> > The generic definition aliases hw_pte_t to pte_t, so this series preserves
> > the representation and behaviour of every architecture. ptep_get() keeps
> > its existing READ_ONCE() semantics and converts the stored element through
> > __pte_from_hw(). An architecture can later define a distinct hw_pte_t and
> > convert its PTE interfaces to make the distinction compiler-enforced.
> > Architecture PTE implementations and most architecture code are
> > deliberately left for those later opt-in conversions.
...
> Do you have a pointer at the arm64 part, so people can get a feeling for how an
> actual hw_pte_t implementation can look like.

May be we need the generic hw_pte_t implementation as { pte_t pte; }
right away?

Also, can you envision a case when sizeof(pte_t) != sizeof(hw_pte_t)?
If not, the compile-time check is worth adding.

> -- 
> Cheers,
> 
> David

Thanks!