Re: [PATCH] x86, bitops, variable_test_bit should return 1 not -1 on a match

From: Ingo Molnar
Date: Fri Aug 21 2015 - 02:51:15 EST



* Prarit Bhargava <prarit@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> This issue was noticed while debugging a CPU hotplug issue. On x86
> with (NR_CPUS > 1) the cpu_online() define is cpumask_test_cpu().
> cpumask_test_cpu() should return 1 if the cpu is set in cpumask and
> 0 otherwise.
>
> However, cpumask_test_cpu() returns -1 if the cpu in the cpumask is
> set and 0 otherwise. This happens because cpumask_test_cpu() calls
> test_bit() which is a define that will call variable_test_bit().
>
> variable_test_bit() calls the assembler instruction sbb (Subtract
> with Borrow, " Subtracts the source from the destination, and subtracts 1
> extra if the Carry Flag is set. Results are returned in "dest".)
>
> A bit match results in -1 being returned from variable_test_bit() if a
> match occurs, not 1 as the function is supposed to. This can be easily
> resolved by adding a "!!" to force 0 or 1 as a return.
>
> It looks like the code never does, for example, (test_bit() == 1) so this
> change should not have any impact.
>
> Cc: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: Ingo Molnar <mingo@xxxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@xxxxxxxxx>
> Cc: x86@xxxxxxxxxx
> Cc: linux-kernel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Signed-off-by: Prarit Bhargava <prarit@xxxxxxxxxx>
> ---
> arch/x86/include/asm/bitops.h | 2 +-
> 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)
>
> diff --git a/arch/x86/include/asm/bitops.h b/arch/x86/include/asm/bitops.h
> index cfe3b95..a87a5fb 100644
> --- a/arch/x86/include/asm/bitops.h
> +++ b/arch/x86/include/asm/bitops.h
> @@ -320,7 +320,7 @@ static inline int variable_test_bit(long nr, volatile const unsigned long *addr)
> : "=r" (oldbit)
> : "m" (*(unsigned long *)addr), "Ir" (nr));
>
> - return oldbit;
> + return !!oldbit;
> }
>
> #if 0 /* Fool kernel-doc since it doesn't do macros yet */

Ok, I think this is a good fix to improve the robustness of this primitive, unless
someone objects.

I tried to find the CPU hotplug code that broke with cpu_online() returning -1 but
failed - all current mainline usage sites seem to be testing for nonzero in one
way or another. Could you please point it out?

Thanks,

Ingo
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/