On Wed, Jan 03, 2007 at 01:22:32PM -0800, Andrew Morton wrote:
> It's nice to always have a comment explaining the use of open-coded
> barriers.  Because often the reader is left wondered what on earth it's
> barriering against what on earth else.
> 

Ok, here it is...


Andrew asked that the open-coded barriers be commented, so here it
is.  I also realized that one of the read barriers was in an area
where the protecting mutex was held, so no read barrier was needed.

Signed-off-by: Corey Minyard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

Index: linux-2.6.19/drivers/char/ipmi/ipmi_msghandler.c
===================================================================
--- linux-2.6.19.orig/drivers/char/ipmi/ipmi_msghandler.c
+++ linux-2.6.19/drivers/char/ipmi/ipmi_msghandler.c
@@ -839,7 +839,6 @@ int ipmi_create_user(unsigned int       
        goto out_kfree;
 
  found:
-       smp_rmb();
        /* Note that each existing user holds a refcount to the interface. */
        kref_get(&intf->refcount);
 
@@ -2762,10 +2761,15 @@ int ipmi_register_smi(struct ipmi_smi_ha
                synchronize_rcu();
                kref_put(&intf->refcount, intf_free);
        } else {
-               /* After this point the interface is legal to use. */
-               smp_wmb(); /* Keep memory order straight for RCU readers. */
+               /*
+                * Keep memory order straight for RCU readers.  Make
+                * sure everything else is committed to memory before
+                * setting intf_num to mark the interface valid.
+                */
+               smp_wmb();
                intf->intf_num = i;
                mutex_unlock(&ipmi_interfaces_mutex);
+               /* After this point the interface is legal to use. */
                call_smi_watchers(i, intf->si_dev);
                mutex_unlock(&smi_watchers_mutex);
        }
@@ -3927,6 +3931,12 @@ static void send_panic_events(char *str)
                        /* Interface was not ready yet. */
                        continue;
 
+               /*
+                * intf_num is used as an marker to tell if the
+                * interface is valid.  Thus we need a read barrier to
+                * make sure data fetched before checking intf_num
+                * won't be used.
+                */
                smp_rmb();
 
                /* First job here is to figure out where to send the

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