Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S933728AbXHJIjZ (ORCPT ); Fri, 10 Aug 2007 04:39:25 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1765609AbXHJIjH (ORCPT ); Fri, 10 Aug 2007 04:39:07 -0400 Received: from rhun.apana.org.au ([64.62.148.172]:3240 "EHLO arnor.apana.org.au" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-FAIL) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1757030AbXHJIjB (ORCPT ); Fri, 10 Aug 2007 04:39:01 -0400 From: Herbert Xu To: paulmck@linux.vnet.ibm.com Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/24] make atomic_read() behave consistently on alpha Cc: csnook@redhat.com, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, linux-arch@vger.kernel.org, torvalds@linux-foundation.org, netdev@vger.kernel.org, akpm@linux-foundation.org, ak@suse.de, heiko.carstens@de.ibm.com, davem@davemloft.net, schwidefsky@de.ibm.com, wensong@linux-vs.org, horms@verge.net.au, wjiang@resilience.com, cfriesen@nortel.com, zlynx@acm.org, rpjday@mindspring.com, jesper.juhl@gmail.com Organization: Core In-Reply-To: <20070809161024.GC8424@linux.vnet.ibm.com> X-Newsgroups: apana.lists.os.linux.kernel,apana.lists.os.linux.netdev User-Agent: tin/1.7.4-20040225 ("Benbecula") (UNIX) (Linux/2.6.17-rc4 (i686)) Message-Id: Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2007 16:21:46 +0800 Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 903 Lines: 22 Paul E. McKenney wrote: > > The compiler is within its rights to read a 32-bit quantity 16 bits at > at time, even on a 32-bit machine. I would be glad to help pummel any > compiler writer that pulls such a dirty trick, but the C standard really > does permit this. Code all over the kernel assumes that 32-bit reads/writes are atomic so while such a compiler might be legal it certainly can't compile Linux. Cheers, -- Visit Openswan at http://www.openswan.org/ Email: Herbert Xu ~{PmV>HI~} Home Page: http://gondor.apana.org.au/~herbert/ PGP Key: http://gondor.apana.org.au/~herbert/pubkey.txt - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/