linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 0/5] Add READ_ONCE and WRITE

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Message-ID: <be85a8be-2def-48b4-9bee-9c2a8c063608@paulmck-laptop>
Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2026 11:17:48 -0800
From: "Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@...nel.org>
To: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@...radead.org>
Cc: Boqun Feng <boqun.feng@...il.com>,
	Andreas Hindborg <a.hindborg@...nel.org>,
	Alice Ryhl <aliceryhl@...gle.com>, Gary Guo <gary@...yguo.net>,
	Will Deacon <will@...nel.org>,
	Richard Henderson <richard.henderson@...aro.org>,
	Matt Turner <mattst88@...il.com>,
	Magnus Lindholm <linmag7@...il.com>,
	Catalin Marinas <catalin.marinas@....com>,
	Miguel Ojeda <ojeda@...nel.org>,
	Björn Roy Baron <bjorn3_gh@...tonmail.com>,
	Benno Lossin <lossin@...nel.org>, Trevor Gross <tmgross@...ch.edu>,
	Danilo Krummrich <dakr@...nel.org>,
	Mark Rutland <mark.rutland@....com>,
	FUJITA Tomonori <fujita.tomonori@...il.com>,
	Frederic Weisbecker <frederic@...nel.org>,
	Lyude Paul <lyude@...hat.com>, Thomas Gleixner <tglx@...utronix.de>,
	Anna-Maria Behnsen <anna-maria@...utronix.de>,
	John Stultz <jstultz@...gle.com>, Stephen Boyd <sboyd@...nel.org>,
	Alexander Viro <viro@...iv.linux.org.uk>,
	Christian Brauner <brauner@...nel.org>, Jan Kara <jack@...e.cz>,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, linux-alpha@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-arm-kernel@...ts.infradead.org,
	rust-for-linux@...r.kernel.org, linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org,
	kasan-dev@...glegroups.com
Subject: Re: [PATCH 0/5] Add READ_ONCE and WRITE_ONCE to Rust

On Wed, Jan 07, 2026 at 09:43:22AM +0100, Peter Zijlstra wrote:
> On Tue, Jan 06, 2026 at 10:18:35AM -0800, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> > On Tue, Jan 06, 2026 at 03:56:22PM +0100, Peter Zijlstra wrote:
> > > On Tue, Jan 06, 2026 at 09:09:37PM +0800, Boqun Feng wrote:
> > > 
> > > > Some C code believes a plain write to a properly aligned location is
> > > > atomic (see KCSAN_ASSUME_PLAIN_WRITES_ATOMIC, and no, this doesn't mean
> > > > it's recommended to assume such), and I guess that's the case for
> > > > hrtimer, if it's not much a trouble you can replace the plain write with
> > > > WRITE_ONCE() on C side ;-)
> > > 
> > > GCC used to provide this guarantee, some of the older code was written
> > > on that. GCC no longer provides that guarantee (there are known cases
> > > where it breaks and all that) and newer code should not rely on this.
> > > 
> > > All such places *SHOULD* be updated to use READ_ONCE/WRITE_ONCE.
> > 
> > Agreed!
> > 
> > In that vein, any objections to the patch shown below?
> 
> Not really; although it would of course be nice if that were accompanied
> with a pile of cleanup patches taking out the worst offenders or
> somesuch ;-)

Careful what you ask for.  You might get it...  ;-)

							Thanx, Paul

> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > 
> > diff --git a/lib/Kconfig.kcsan b/lib/Kconfig.kcsan
> > index 4ce4b0c0109cb..e827e24ab5d42 100644
> > --- a/lib/Kconfig.kcsan
> > +++ b/lib/Kconfig.kcsan
> > @@ -199,7 +199,7 @@ config KCSAN_WEAK_MEMORY
> >  
> >  config KCSAN_REPORT_VALUE_CHANGE_ONLY
> >  	bool "Only report races where watcher observed a data value change"
> > -	default y
> > +	default n
> >  	depends on !KCSAN_STRICT
> >  	help
> >  	  If enabled and a conflicting write is observed via a watchpoint, but
> > @@ -208,7 +208,7 @@ config KCSAN_REPORT_VALUE_CHANGE_ONLY
> >  
> >  config KCSAN_ASSUME_PLAIN_WRITES_ATOMIC
> >  	bool "Assume that plain aligned writes up to word size are atomic"
> > -	default y
> > +	default n
> >  	depends on !KCSAN_STRICT
> >  	help
> >  	  Assume that plain aligned writes up to word size are atomic by