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<title>musl/src/process, branch v1.1.4</title>
<subtitle>musl - an implementation of the standard library for Linux-based systems</subtitle>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/'/>
<entry>
<title>eliminate use of cached pid from thread structure</title>
<updated>2014-07-06T03:29:55+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-07-06T03:29:55+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=83dc6eb087633abcf5608ad651d3b525ca2ec35e'/>
<id>83dc6eb087633abcf5608ad651d3b525ca2ec35e</id>
<content type='text'>
the main motivation for this change is to remove the assumption that
the tid of the main thread is also the pid of the process. (the value
returned by the set_tid_address syscall was used to fill both fields
despite it semantically being the tid.) this is historically and
presently true on linux and unlikely to change, but it conceivably
could be false on other systems that otherwise reproduce the linux
syscall api/abi.

only a few parts of the code were actually still using the cached pid.
in a couple places (aio and synccall) it was a minor optimization to
avoid a syscall. caching could be reintroduced, but lazily as part of
the public getpid function rather than at program startup, if it's
deemed important for performance later. in other places (cancellation
and pthread_kill) the pid was completely unnecessary; the tkill
syscall can be used instead of tgkill. this is actually a rather
subtle issue, since tgkill is supposedly a solution to race conditions
that can affect use of tkill. however, as documented in the commit
message for commit 7779dbd2663269b465951189b4f43e70839bc073, tgkill
does not actually solve this race; it just limits it to happening
within one process rather than between processes. we use a lock that
avoids the race in pthread_kill, and the use in the cancellation
signal handler is self-targeted and thus not subject to tid reuse
races, so both are safe regardless of which syscall (tgkill or tkill)
is used.
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<pre>
the main motivation for this change is to remove the assumption that
the tid of the main thread is also the pid of the process. (the value
returned by the set_tid_address syscall was used to fill both fields
despite it semantically being the tid.) this is historically and
presently true on linux and unlikely to change, but it conceivably
could be false on other systems that otherwise reproduce the linux
syscall api/abi.

only a few parts of the code were actually still using the cached pid.
in a couple places (aio and synccall) it was a minor optimization to
avoid a syscall. caching could be reintroduced, but lazily as part of
the public getpid function rather than at program startup, if it's
deemed important for performance later. in other places (cancellation
and pthread_kill) the pid was completely unnecessary; the tkill
syscall can be used instead of tgkill. this is actually a rather
subtle issue, since tgkill is supposedly a solution to race conditions
that can affect use of tkill. however, as documented in the commit
message for commit 7779dbd2663269b465951189b4f43e70839bc073, tgkill
does not actually solve this race; it just limits it to happening
within one process rather than between processes. we use a lock that
avoids the race in pthread_kill, and the use in the cancellation
signal handler is self-targeted and thus not subject to tid reuse
races, so both are safe regardless of which syscall (tgkill or tkill)
is used.
</pre>
</div>
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>fix ungrammatical comment in posix_spawn code</title>
<updated>2014-07-01T22:32:52+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-07-01T22:32:52+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=0b3d33d4d27731f0d80f726fd114c8b9cb3322be'/>
<id>0b3d33d4d27731f0d80f726fd114c8b9cb3322be</id>
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<pre>
</pre>
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</entry>
<entry>
<title>additional fixes for linux kernel apis with old syscalls removed</title>
<updated>2014-05-30T05:51:23+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-05-30T05:51:23+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=5cf9e8f860dcfe63b36e050dd7dfbc5e53745fce'/>
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<pre>
</pre>
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</entry>
<entry>
<title>support linux kernel apis (new archs) with old syscalls removed</title>
<updated>2014-05-30T01:01:32+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-05-30T01:01:32+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=dd5f50da6f6c3df5647e922e47f8568a8896a752'/>
<id>dd5f50da6f6c3df5647e922e47f8568a8896a752</id>
<content type='text'>
such archs are expected to omit definitions of the SYS_* macros for
syscalls their kernels lack from arch/$ARCH/bits/syscall.h. the
preprocessor is then able to select the an appropriate implementation
for affected functions. two basic strategies are used on a
case-by-case basis:

where the old syscalls correspond to deprecated library-level
functions, the deprecated functions have been converted to wrappers
for the modern function, and the modern function has fallback code
(omitted at the preprocessor level on new archs) to make use of the
old syscalls if the new syscall fails with ENOSYS. this also improves
functionality on older kernels and eliminates the incentive to program
with deprecated library-level functions for the sake of compatibility
with older kernels.

in other situations where the old syscalls correspond to library-level
functions which are not deprecated but merely lack some new features,
such as the *at functions, the old syscalls are still used on archs
which support them. this may change at some point in the future if or
when fallback code is added to the new functions to make them usable
(possibly with reduced functionality) on old kernels.
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<pre>
such archs are expected to omit definitions of the SYS_* macros for
syscalls their kernels lack from arch/$ARCH/bits/syscall.h. the
preprocessor is then able to select the an appropriate implementation
for affected functions. two basic strategies are used on a
case-by-case basis:

where the old syscalls correspond to deprecated library-level
functions, the deprecated functions have been converted to wrappers
for the modern function, and the modern function has fallback code
(omitted at the preprocessor level on new archs) to make use of the
old syscalls if the new syscall fails with ENOSYS. this also improves
functionality on older kernels and eliminates the incentive to program
with deprecated library-level functions for the sake of compatibility
with older kernels.

in other situations where the old syscalls correspond to library-level
functions which are not deprecated but merely lack some new features,
such as the *at functions, the old syscalls are still used on archs
which support them. this may change at some point in the future if or
when fallback code is added to the new functions to make them usable
(possibly with reduced functionality) on old kernels.
</pre>
</div>
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>support kernels with no SYS_open syscall, only SYS_openat</title>
<updated>2014-05-25T02:54:05+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-05-25T02:54:05+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=594c827a22124ae550b9a877b8188e0898dff8db'/>
<id>594c827a22124ae550b9a877b8188e0898dff8db</id>
<content type='text'>
open is handled specially because it is used from so many places, in
so many variants (2 or 3 arguments, setting errno or not, and
cancellable or not). trying to do it as a function would not only
increase bloat, but would also risk subtle breakage.

this is the first step towards supporting "new" archs where linux
lacks "old" syscalls.
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<pre>
open is handled specially because it is used from so many places, in
so many variants (2 or 3 arguments, setting errno or not, and
cancellable or not). trying to do it as a function would not only
increase bloat, but would also risk subtle breakage.

this is the first step towards supporting "new" archs where linux
lacks "old" syscalls.
</pre>
</div>
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>expose public execvpe interface</title>
<updated>2014-04-20T04:26:55+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>M Farkas-Dyck</name>
<email>strake888@gmail.com</email>
</author>
<published>2014-04-19T03:40:28+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=164c5c7a32eefa1800a42e07a47b4cc2d64cc802'/>
<id>164c5c7a32eefa1800a42e07a47b4cc2d64cc802</id>
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</content>
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<pre>
</pre>
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</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>always initialize thread pointer at program start</title>
<updated>2014-03-24T20:57:11+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-03-24T20:57:11+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=dab441aea240f3b7c18a26d2ef51979ea36c301c'/>
<id>dab441aea240f3b7c18a26d2ef51979ea36c301c</id>
<content type='text'>
this is the first step in an overhaul aimed at greatly simplifying and
optimizing everything dealing with thread-local state.

previously, the thread pointer was initialized lazily on first access,
or at program startup if stack protector was in use, or at certain
random places where inconsistent state could be reached if it were not
initialized early. while believed to be fully correct, the logic was
fragile and non-obvious.

in the first phase of the thread pointer overhaul, support is retained
(and in some cases improved) for systems/situation where loading the
thread pointer fails, e.g. old kernels.

some notes on specific changes:

- the confusing use of libc.main_thread as an indicator that the
  thread pointer is initialized is eliminated in favor of an explicit
  has_thread_pointer predicate.

- sigaction no longer needs to ensure that the thread pointer is
  initialized before installing a signal handler (this was needed to
  prevent a situation where the signal handler caused the thread
  pointer to be initialized and the subsequent sigreturn cleared it
  again) but it still needs to ensure that implementation-internal
  thread-related signals are not blocked.

- pthread tsd initialization for the main thread is deferred in a new
  manner to minimize bloat in the static-linked __init_tp code.

- pthread_setcancelstate no longer needs special handling for the
  situation before the thread pointer is initialized. it simply fails
  on systems that cannot support a thread pointer, which are
  non-conforming anyway.

- pthread_cleanup_push/pop now check for missing thread pointer and
  nop themselves out in this case, so stdio no longer needs to avoid
  the cancellable path when the thread pointer is not available.

a number of cases remain where certain interfaces may crash if the
system does not support a thread pointer. at this point, these should
be limited to pthread interfaces, and the number of such cases should
be fewer than before.
</content>
<content type='xhtml'>
<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'>
<pre>
this is the first step in an overhaul aimed at greatly simplifying and
optimizing everything dealing with thread-local state.

previously, the thread pointer was initialized lazily on first access,
or at program startup if stack protector was in use, or at certain
random places where inconsistent state could be reached if it were not
initialized early. while believed to be fully correct, the logic was
fragile and non-obvious.

in the first phase of the thread pointer overhaul, support is retained
(and in some cases improved) for systems/situation where loading the
thread pointer fails, e.g. old kernels.

some notes on specific changes:

- the confusing use of libc.main_thread as an indicator that the
  thread pointer is initialized is eliminated in favor of an explicit
  has_thread_pointer predicate.

- sigaction no longer needs to ensure that the thread pointer is
  initialized before installing a signal handler (this was needed to
  prevent a situation where the signal handler caused the thread
  pointer to be initialized and the subsequent sigreturn cleared it
  again) but it still needs to ensure that implementation-internal
  thread-related signals are not blocked.

- pthread tsd initialization for the main thread is deferred in a new
  manner to minimize bloat in the static-linked __init_tp code.

- pthread_setcancelstate no longer needs special handling for the
  situation before the thread pointer is initialized. it simply fails
  on systems that cannot support a thread pointer, which are
  non-conforming anyway.

- pthread_cleanup_push/pop now check for missing thread pointer and
  nop themselves out in this case, so stdio no longer needs to avoid
  the cancellable path when the thread pointer is not available.

a number of cases remain where certain interfaces may crash if the
system does not support a thread pointer. at this point, these should
be limited to pthread interfaces, and the number of such cases should
be fewer than before.
</pre>
</div>
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>x32 port (diff against vanilla x86_64)</title>
<updated>2014-02-23T10:09:16+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>rofl0r</name>
<email>retnyg@gmx.net</email>
</author>
<published>2014-01-07T21:53:38+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=664cd341921007cea52c8891f27ce35927dca378'/>
<id>664cd341921007cea52c8891f27ce35927dca378</id>
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<pre>
</pre>
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</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>import vanilla x86_64 code as x32</title>
<updated>2014-02-23T10:07:18+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>rofl0r</name>
<email>retnyg@gmx.net</email>
</author>
<published>2014-01-07T21:43:34+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=323272db175204b951f119dae4bd99ef05e20f13'/>
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<pre>
</pre>
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</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>make posix_spawn accept null pid pointer arguments</title>
<updated>2014-02-12T06:03:07+00:00</updated>
<author>
<name>Rich Felker</name>
<email>dalias@aerifal.cx</email>
</author>
<published>2014-02-12T06:03:07+00:00</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://git.musl-libc.org/cgit/musl/commit/?id=8011614da008032642aa8292c3fd079bf7a8843d'/>
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this is a requirement in the specification that was overlooked.
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this is a requirement in the specification that was overlooked.
</pre>
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</entry>
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