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Date:      Wed, 26 Dec 2001 17:16:28 +0100 (CET)
From:      Michal Mertl <mime@traveller.cz>
To:        John Hanley <jh_@yahoo.com>
Cc:        arch@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: 64 bit counters
Message-ID:  <Pine.BSF.4.41.0112261654060.20665-100000@prg.traveller.cz>
In-Reply-To: <20011226005810.5475.qmail@web10102.mail.yahoo.com>

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On Tue, 25 Dec 2001, John Hanley wrote:

> My only caution is this:
>
> On some platforms, 64 bit ints are not atomically written.
> First 32 bits is written, then the remaining 32.  If, say,
> only the bottom half of the kernel accesses the counter,

What do you mean by "the bottom half of the kernel"?

> then likely all is well.  If an interrupt routine can read
> or write in the middle of a non-atomic operation, then all
> hell can break loose, in ways that are extremely difficult
> to track down because they only happen rarely.
>

Well I didn't think of that but I believe it shouldn't be that much a
problem. At most the counter could become wrong :-).


-- 
Michal Mertl
mime@traveller.cz



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