[lldb-dev] Proposal: How to modify lldb for non 8-bit bytes for kalimba processors
Sean Callanan
scallanan at apple.com
Fri Aug 29 09:32:42 PDT 2014
One thing that would make testing infinitely easier is if there were a simulator of a 24-bit byte architecture that we could use in our test suite.
It wouldn’t have to simulate the CPU or anything like that – it would just have to let LLDB attach (maybe via the gdb-remote protocol?) and vend information about a very simple core file… enough information that should allow LLDB to backtrace.
Then we would just have to validate the resulting backtrace to make sure we haven’t regressed the fundamentals of unusual byte sizes.
Sean
> On Aug 29, 2014, at 9:17 AM, Todd Fiala <tfiala at google.com> wrote:
>
> > "You can't possibly do that, so many other architectures have 8-bit bytes, and so this proposal would make them harder to enhance, for the benefit of (currently) just kalimba"
>
> From a design principle, I would probably vote for having non-8-bit-bytes added as a layer on top of memory accesses that is only used for systems that need it. I'd strongly prefer not to have the generality of n-bit (or multiple of 8-bit bytes) permute throughout the lldb code base. I can see that becoming challenging from a maintainability standpoint (testing, code complexity, etc.)
>
> I could imagine a layer you build on top of memory accesses that knows how to run out and grab the right underlying cpu_arch-specific bytes to satisfy the request. And only wiring that in to low level memory access maybe in the memory read/write virtual methods (like Process::DoReadMemory() and friends).
>
> That's just my take. Maintainability and testability being the key driver here.
>
>
> On Fri, Aug 29, 2014 at 5:11 AM, Matthew Gardiner <mg11 at csr.com <mailto:mg11 at csr.com>> wrote:
> Based on some recent investigation, it looks as if I won't need to modify the CoreDefinition structure of ArchSpec.cpp. In a local change, I've added specification for the kalimba variants in the SubArchType of llvm::Triple. So it's now possible for me to implement
>
> uint32_t ArchSpec::GetCodeByteSize() const
> uint32_t ArchSpec::GetDataByteSize() const
>
> by inspection of subarch field of the triple contained in ArchSpec.
>
> However, I'd still appreciate some feedback on a more conceptual level regarding this proposal.
>
> thanks
> Matt
>
> Matthew Gardiner wrote:
> Hi folks,
>
> One of the challenges that I need to resolve regarding debugging kalimba processors, is that certain variants have different notions of the size (in bits) of a byte, compared to a lot of more mainstream processors. What I'm referring to is the size of a minimum addressable unit, when the processor accesses memory. For example, on a kalimba architecture version 3, a "byte" (minimum addressable unit) from the data bus is 24-bits, so if the processor reads from address 8001 it reads 24-bits, and from address 8002 the next 24-bits are read, and so on... (this also means that for this variant a char, int, long, pointer are 24-bits in size). For kalimba architecture version 4, however, we have the minimum addressable unit being 8-bits, and correspondingly more "conventional" sizes for primitive types.
>
> I imagine that this will effect the kalimba lldb port is various ways. The most obvious one, and hence the one I'd like to solve first, is that way in which raw memory read/write are implemented. As an example when I ask lldb to read 4 "bytes" (addressable units worth of data) from a kalimba with 8-bit bytes I expect to see this:
>
> (lldb) memory read --count 4 0x0328
> 0x00000328: 00 07 08 08 ....
> (lldb)
>
> However if target processor has 24-bit bytes then I expect the same query to yield the following answer:
>
> (lldb) memory read --count 4 0x0328
> 0x00000328: 000708 080012 095630 023480 ....
> (lldb)
>
> Just considering the above scenario leads me to believe that my first challenge is arranging for the remote protocol implementation (currently Process/gdb-remote et al) to assume Nx host bytes (N being a target-specific value) for each target byte accessed, and for the memory read and formatting code (above) to behave correctly, given the discrepancy between host and target byte sizes. I guess I'll see many other challenges - for example, frame variable decode, stack unwind etc. (but since *those* challenges require work on clang/llvm backend, and CSR have no llvm person yet, I want to concentrate on raw memory access first...)
>
> For an added complication (since kalimba is a harvard architecture) certain kalimba variants have differing addressable unit sizes for memory on the code bus and data bus. Kalimba Architecture 5 has 8-bit addressable code, and 24-bit addressable data...
>
> My initial idea for how to start to address the above challenge is to augment the CoreDefinition structure in ArchSpec.cpp as follows:
>
> struct CoreDefinition
> {
> ByteOrder default_byte_order;
> uint32_t addr_byte_size;
> uint32_t min_opcode_byte_size;
> uint32_t max_opcode_byte_size;
> + uint32_t code_byte_size;
> + uint32_t data_byte_size;
> llvm::Triple::ArchType machine;
> ArchSpec::Core core;
> const char * const name;
> };
>
> Where code_byte_size and data_byte_size would specify the size in host (8-bit) bytes the sizes of the minimum addressable units on the referenced architectures. So, e.g.
> For kalimba 3, with 24-bit data bytes and 32-bit code bytes we'd have data_byte_size=3 and code_byte_size=4
> For kalimba 4, with 8-bit data bytes and 8-bit code bytes we'd have data_byte_size=1 and code_byte_size=1
>
> So, then I'd update the g_core_definitions array within ArchSpec.cpp accordingly, such that all non-kalimbas would have 1 as the setting for the new datas and the kalimba entries would have those fields made to match the architectures.
>
> The ArchSpec class would then require the following accessors: uint32_t GetCodeByteSize() and uint32_t GetDataByteSize(); to supply client code with the required hints to correctly implement memory accesses.
>
> My next plan would be to "massage" the code in the execution flow from an (lldb) memory read invocation through to the gdb-remote comms until I see the memory read examples I illustrated above, working for 8-bit and 24-bit data kalimba targets.
>
> I'd appreciate all comments and opinions as to what I've described above from the lldb community. Basically, I'm curious as to what people think of the whole concept, e.g.
>
> "You can't possibly do that, so many other architectures have 8-bit bytes, and so this proposal would make them harder to enhance, for the benefit of (currently) just kalimba"
> "Yes, that's a good idea, lldb can accommodate the most unusual of architectures"
>
> And I'm also interested in technical comments, e.g. should an instance of CoreDefinition be added to ArchSpec, or is just adding the extra byte-size attributes sufficient... or if anyone thinks that modifying gdb-remote is a bad idea, and that I should be creating kalimba process abstractions (and factor out the common code)?
>
> thanks
> Matt
>
>
>
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