Re: [patch RFC 5/5] x86/speculation: Add basic speculation control code

From: Andrea Arcangeli
Date: Wed Jan 10 2018 - 07:28:06 EST


On Wed, Jan 10, 2018 at 01:20:45PM +0100, Andrea Arcangeli wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 10, 2018 at 12:12:53PM +0000, David Woodhouse wrote:
> > IBRS is like a barrier. You must write it between the 'problematic'
> > loading of the branch targets, and the kernel code which might be
> > affected.
> >
> > You cannot, on current hardware, merely set it once and forget about
> > it. That is not sufficient.
>
> I think you've got it all wrong...

On a side note, I hope once you get it right, the debugfs tunable will
suddenly look less horrid.