documentation: Document PR_RISCV_SET_ICACHE_FLUSH_CTX prctl

Provide documentation that explains how to properly do CMODX in riscv.

Signed-off-by: Charlie Jenkins <charlie@rivosinc.com>
Reviewed-by: Atish Patra <atishp@rivosinc.com>
Reviewed-by: Alexandre Ghiti <alexghiti@rivosinc.com>
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20240312-fencei-v13-3-4b6bdc2bbf32@rivosinc.com
Signed-off-by: Palmer Dabbelt <palmer@rivosinc.com>

2 files changed, 99 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/arch/riscv/cmodx.rst b/Documentation/arch/riscv/cmodx.rst
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..1c0ca06b6c97
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Documentation/arch/riscv/cmodx.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,98 @@
+.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0
+
+==============================================================================
+Concurrent Modification and Execution of Instructions (CMODX) for RISC-V Linux
+==============================================================================
+
+CMODX is a programming technique where a program executes instructions that were
+modified by the program itself. Instruction storage and the instruction cache
+(icache) are not guaranteed to be synchronized on RISC-V hardware. Therefore, the
+program must enforce its own synchronization with the unprivileged fence.i
+instruction.
+
+However, the default Linux ABI prohibits the use of fence.i in userspace
+applications. At any point the scheduler may migrate a task onto a new hart. If
+migration occurs after the userspace synchronized the icache and instruction
+storage with fence.i, the icache on the new hart will no longer be clean. This
+is due to the behavior of fence.i only affecting the hart that it is called on.
+Thus, the hart that the task has been migrated to may not have synchronized
+instruction storage and icache.
+
+There are two ways to solve this problem: use the riscv_flush_icache() syscall,
+or use the ``PR_RISCV_SET_ICACHE_FLUSH_CTX`` prctl() and emit fence.i in
+userspace. The syscall performs a one-off icache flushing operation. The prctl
+changes the Linux ABI to allow userspace to emit icache flushing operations.
+
+As an aside, "deferred" icache flushes can sometimes be triggered in the kernel.
+At the time of writing, this only occurs during the riscv_flush_icache() syscall
+and when the kernel uses copy_to_user_page(). These deferred flushes happen only
+when the memory map being used by a hart changes. If the prctl() context caused
+an icache flush, this deferred icache flush will be skipped as it is redundant.
+Therefore, there will be no additional flush when using the riscv_flush_icache()
+syscall inside of the prctl() context.
+
+prctl() Interface
+---------------------
+
+Call prctl() with ``PR_RISCV_SET_ICACHE_FLUSH_CTX`` as the first argument. The
+remaining arguments will be delegated to the riscv_set_icache_flush_ctx
+function detailed below.
+
+.. kernel-doc:: arch/riscv/mm/cacheflush.c
+	:identifiers: riscv_set_icache_flush_ctx
+
+Example usage:
+
+The following files are meant to be compiled and linked with each other. The
+modify_instruction() function replaces an add with 0 with an add with one,
+causing the instruction sequence in get_value() to change from returning a zero
+to returning a one.
+
+cmodx.c::
+
+	#include <stdio.h>
+	#include <sys/prctl.h>
+
+	extern int get_value();
+	extern void modify_instruction();
+
+	int main()
+	{
+		int value = get_value();
+		printf("Value before cmodx: %d\n", value);
+
+		// Call prctl before first fence.i is called inside modify_instruction
+		prctl(PR_RISCV_SET_ICACHE_FLUSH_CTX_ON, PR_RISCV_CTX_SW_FENCEI, PR_RISCV_SCOPE_PER_PROCESS);
+		modify_instruction();
+		// Call prctl after final fence.i is called in process
+		prctl(PR_RISCV_SET_ICACHE_FLUSH_CTX_OFF, PR_RISCV_CTX_SW_FENCEI, PR_RISCV_SCOPE_PER_PROCESS);
+
+		value = get_value();
+		printf("Value after cmodx: %d\n", value);
+		return 0;
+	}
+
+cmodx.S::
+
+	.option norvc
+
+	.text
+	.global modify_instruction
+	modify_instruction:
+	lw a0, new_insn
+	lui a5,%hi(old_insn)
+	sw  a0,%lo(old_insn)(a5)
+	fence.i
+	ret
+
+	.section modifiable, "awx"
+	.global get_value
+	get_value:
+	li a0, 0
+	old_insn:
+	addi a0, a0, 0
+	ret
+
+	.data
+	new_insn:
+	addi a0, a0, 1
diff --git a/Documentation/arch/riscv/index.rst b/Documentation/arch/riscv/index.rst
index 4dab0cb4b900..eecf347ce849 100644
--- a/Documentation/arch/riscv/index.rst
+++ b/Documentation/arch/riscv/index.rst
@@ -13,6 +13,7 @@ RISC-V architecture
     patch-acceptance
     uabi
     vector
+    cmodx
 
     features