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-rw-r--r--Documentation/memory-barriers.txt10
1 files changed, 7 insertions, 3 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/memory-barriers.txt b/Documentation/memory-barriers.txt
index 904ee42d078e..e26058d3e253 100644
--- a/Documentation/memory-barriers.txt
+++ b/Documentation/memory-barriers.txt
@@ -800,9 +800,13 @@ In summary:
use smp_rmb(), smp_wmb(), or, in the case of prior stores and
later loads, smp_mb().
- (*) If both legs of the "if" statement begin with identical stores
- to the same variable, a barrier() statement is required at the
- beginning of each leg of the "if" statement.
+ (*) If both legs of the "if" statement begin with identical stores to
+ the same variable, then those stores must be ordered, either by
+ preceding both of them with smp_mb() or by using smp_store_release()
+ to carry out the stores. Please note that it is -not- sufficient
+ to use barrier() at beginning of each leg of the "if" statement,
+ as optimizing compilers do not necessarily respect barrier()
+ in this case.
(*) Control dependencies require at least one run-time conditional
between the prior load and the subsequent store, and this