On Thu, 7 Jun 2007, Satyam Sharma wrote:
> On 6/7/07, Robert P. J. Day <[email protected]> wrote:
> > On Thu, 7 Jun 2007, Nick Piggin wrote:
> >
> > > Robert P. J. Day wrote:
> > > > probably making a fool of myself here, but what is the purpose of
> > > > that single argument to the macro "ZERO_PAGE"?
> > > >
> > > > $ grep -r "define ZERO_PAGE" include
> > > > include/asm-frv/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr) ({ BUG(); NULL;
> > })
> > > > include/asm-frv/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr)
> > > > virt_to_page(empty_zero_page)
> > > > include/asm-v850/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr) ((void
> > *)0x87654321)
> > > > include/asm-mips/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr) \
> > > > include/asm-blackfin/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr)
> > (virt_to_page(0))
> > > > include/asm-parisc/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr)
> > > > (virt_to_page(empty_zero_page))
> > > > include/asm-alpha/pgtable.h:#define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr)
> > > > (virt_to_page(ZERO_PGE))
> > > > ...
> > > >
> > > > AFAICT, there are no definitions of that macro that actually use
> > > > that argument. is that some kind of historical cruft?
> > >
> > > MIPS?
> >
> > argh. that would be the *one* definition whose output got chopped
> > because of line continuation, and it would be only one that actually
> > uses the argument:
> >
> > #define ZERO_PAGE(vaddr) \
> > (virt_to_page((void *)(empty_zero_page + (((unsigned long)(vaddr)) &
> > zero_page_mask))))
> >
> >
> > but it still leaves the question -- if ZERO_PAGE is meant to represent
> > a single, global shared page that is always zero, why would it *ever*
> > need to take an argument? and what's so special about MIPS that it
> > differs from all the rest?
>
> The comment above empty_zero_page and zero_page_mask
> declarations at arch/mips/mm/init.c:508 sheds light on this ...
well, it *sort of* does. at line 64 of that file:
/*
* We have up to 8 empty zeroed pages so we can map one of the right colour
* when needed. This is necessary only on R4000 / R4400 SC and MC versions
* where we have to avoid VCED / VECI exceptions for good performance at
* any price. Since page is never written to after the initialization we
* don't have to care about aliases on other CPUs.
*/
although it's not clear where in the source tree are the invocations
that would actually make a difference to a MIPS system, which is why
i've CC'ed ralf on this. i'm sure he can clear this up. :-)
rday
--
========================================================================
Robert P. J. Day
Linux Consulting, Training and Annoying Kernel Pedantry
Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA
http://fsdev.net/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
========================================================================
-
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to [email protected]
More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
[Index of Archives]
[Kernel Newbies]
[Netfilter]
[Bugtraq]
[Photo]
[Stuff]
[Gimp]
[Yosemite News]
[MIPS Linux]
[ARM Linux]
[Linux Security]
[Linux RAID]
[Video 4 Linux]
[Linux for the blind]
[Linux Resources]
