powerpc: Fix "attempt to move .org backwards" error
Building a 64-bit powerpc kernel with PR KVM enabled currently gives
this error:
AS arch/powerpc/kernel/head_64.o
arch/powerpc/kernel/exceptions-64s.S: Assembler messages:
arch/powerpc/kernel/exceptions-64s.S:258: Error: attempt to move .org backwards
make[2]: *** [arch/powerpc/kernel/head_64.o] Error 1
This happens because the MASKABLE_EXCEPTION_PSERIES macro turns into
33 instructions, but we only have space for 32 at the decrementer
interrupt vector (from 0x900 to 0x980).
In the code generated by the MASKABLE_EXCEPTION_PSERIES macro, we
currently have two instances of the HMT_MEDIUM macro, which has the
effect of setting the SMT thread priority to medium. One is the
first instruction, and is overwritten by a no-op on processors where
we save the PPR (processor priority register), that is, POWER7 or
later. The other is after we have saved the PPR.
In order to reduce the code at 0x900 by one instruction, we omit the
first HMT_MEDIUM. On processors without SMT this will have no effect
since HMT_MEDIUM is a no-op there. On POWER5 and RS64 machines this
will mean that the first few instructions take a little longer in the
case where a decrementer interrupt occurs when the hardware thread is
running at low SMT priority. On POWER6 and later machines, the
hardware automatically boosts the thread priority when a decrementer
interrupt is taken if the thread priority was below medium, so this
change won't make any difference.
The alternative would be to branch out of line after saving the CFAR.
However, that would incur an extra overhead on all processors, whereas
the approach adopted here only adds overhead on older threaded processors.
Signed-off-by: Paul Mackerras <paulus@samba.org>
Signed-off-by: Benjamin Herrenschmidt <benh@kernel.crashing.org>
2 files changed