Re: [RFC PATCH v1.9 07/14] x86/stacktrace: add function for detecting reliable stack traces

From: Josh Poimboeuf
Date: Mon Jun 13 2016 - 17:59:01 EST


On Thu, Jun 09, 2016 at 10:31:01AM +0200, Jiri Slaby wrote:
> On 04/12/2016, 05:56 PM, Josh Poimboeuf wrote:
> >> We had been using unwinder for over a decade in SUSE but it stopped
> >> working for assembly recently (for obvious reasons). So having a working
> >> and reliable unwinder again is one of the top priorities for us.
> >
> > Since you already have an unwinder in SUSE, it sounds like what you need
> > most urgently is DWARF generation support in objtool so that your
> > unwinder will work again for asm code, right? The kernel already emits
> > DWARF today (for C code), so an upstream unwinder isn't needed first.
>
> Right, that's exact.
>
> > That's high on my TODO list, and the coding is probably 70-80% done. I
> > don't want to hold up progress... But I don't really feel comfortable
> > passing the code off because it's quite a big feature with some major
> > changes to objtool. Being the objtool author, I want to make sure to
> > give it my full attention.
>
> Sure. There is going to be no pressure to merge the v1 of the changes.
> But it would be nice to see what you have now so that we can start
> reviewing and proposing patches on the top of what you have :).

The code is still quite a mess and doesn't even work yet. I think it
would be counterproductive for everybody if I were to share it at this
stage.

> > I'm spread quite thin at the moment but I do hope to have v1 of those
> > patches soon, hopefully May-ish.
>
> So I hope we will see something we can start working on now. I can
> really dedicate one-man hours to that work.

I do appreciate your offer to help. Hopefully soon I'll get it to at
least a decently working and halfway readable state, and then I'll post
it. Then any help will be much appreciated.

--
Josh