Re: pud_bad vs pud_bad

From: Ingo Molnar
Date: Thu Feb 05 2009 - 15:57:58 EST



* Jeremy Fitzhardinge <jeremy@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hugh Dickins wrote:
>> However... I forget how the folding works out. The pgd in the 32-bit
>> PAE case used to have just the pfn and the present bit set in that
>> little array of four entries: if pud_bad() ends up getting applied
>> to that, I guess it will blow up.
>>
>
> Ah, that's a good point.
>
>> If so, my preferred answer would actually be to make those 4 entries
>> look more like real ptes; but you may think I'm being a bit silly.
>
> Hardware doesn't allow it. It will explode (well, trap) if you set
> anything other than P in the top level.

Yeah. I was the first Linux hacker in history to put a x86 CPU into PAE mode
under Linux 10+ years ago, and i can attest to the 'explodes way too easily'
aspect quite emphatically ;-) Took me 3-4 days to bootstrap it.

> By the by, what are the chances we'll be able to deprecate non-PAE 32-bit?

For the next 10 years: pretty much zero.

Ingo
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