linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH][GIT PULL][v2.6.32] tracing/x86: Add check to detect GCC messing with mcount prologue

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Message-ID: <4B0BFFD0.2080203@redhat.com>
Date:	Tue, 24 Nov 2009 15:46:24 +0000
From:	Andrew Haley <aph@...hat.com>
To:	Jakub Jelinek <jakub@...hat.com>
CC:	Thomas Gleixner <tglx@...utronix.de>,
	"H.J. Lu" <hjl.tools@...il.com>, rostedt@...dmis.org,
	Ingo Molnar <mingo@...e.hu>, "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...or.com>,
	LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Heiko Carstens <heiko.carstens@...ibm.com>,
	feng.tang@...el.com, Peter Zijlstra <peterz@...radead.org>,
	Frederic Weisbecker <fweisbec@...il.com>,
	David Daney <ddaney@...iumnetworks.com>,
	Richard Guenther <richard.guenther@...il.com>,
	gcc <gcc@....gnu.org>,
	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH][GIT PULL][v2.6.32] tracing/x86: Add check to detect GCC
 messing with mcount prologue

Jakub Jelinek wrote:
> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 03:32:20PM +0000, Andrew Haley wrote:
>> Jakub Jelinek wrote:
>>> On Tue, Nov 24, 2009 at 03:55:49PM +0100, Thomas Gleixner wrote:
>>>>> you should compile your code with -maccumulate-outgoing-args, and there's
>>>>> no need to use -mtune=generic.  Is that right?
>>>> Seems to work. What other side effects has that ?
>>> Faster code, significant increase in code size though.
>> Does it affect code size when we don't have to realign the stack pointer?
> 
> Yes, a lot.  The difference is that -maccumulate-outgoing-args allocates
> space for arguments of the callee with most arguments in the prologue, using
> subtraction from sp, then to pass arguments uses movl XXX, 4(%esp) etc.
> and the stack pointer doesn't usually change within the function (except for
> alloca/VLAs).
> With -mno-accumulate-outgoing-args args are pushed using push instructions
> and stack pointer is constantly changing.

Alright.  So, it is possible in theory for gcc to generate code that
only uses -maccumulate-outgoing-args when it needs to realign SP.
And, therefore, we could have a nice option for the kernel: one with
(mostly) good code density and never generates the bizarre code
sequence in the prologue.

Andrew.
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