Re: [Linux-fbdev-devel] Re: FBdev updates.

[Petr Vandrovec]

On Mon, Mar 10, 2003 at 06:27:14AM +0800, Antonino Daplas wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-03-10 at 05:29, Petr Vandrovec wrote:
> 
> As for synchronization, I was meaning to ask some pointers on that.  The
> setup currently works like this:
> 
>                         (blink)
> fbcon_cursor         fbcon_vbl_handler (interrupt or timer)   
>      |                     |
>      -----------------------
>                |
>            accel_cursor
>                |
>      -----------------------
>      |                      |
>   hardware              soft_cursor    accel_putcs    accel_putc
>                             |              |               |
>                             -------------- -----------------
>                                            | 
>                                    fb_get_buffer_offset
>                                            |
>                                      xxxfb_imageblit
>                                            |
>                                   -------------------
>                                   |                  |
>                               hardware           software
> 
> 
> I was thinking of placing locks in accel_cursor and
> fb_get_buffer_offset, but I'm not sure.

Maybe just auditing code is enough: cursor_on should be zero while
we are inside accel_putc/putcs (or inside any other fb function), and
if cursor_on is zero, fbcon_vbl_handler should do nothing. So just making
sure that fbcon_vbl_handler is not running on other CPU while we set
cursor_on = 0 should be enough.

> >     if fbdev provides hardware cursor... And HZ/50 delay after
> >     putcs makes orientation on screen very complicated, as there
> >     is no cursor while new characters are appearing on screen.
> 
> The delay is only for the blinking.  After drawing a character/stream of
> characters, an explicit "draw cursor" command immediately follows (I
> think) via fbcon_cursor.

Why we schedule cursor painting at all then? While we are inside putcs,
we cannot paint cursor anyway (as we are busy with painting characters
at cursor position...) and fbcon_cursor(CM_DRAW) should restart timer interval
anyway (so you see cursor while you type characters, and not like Solaris
where cursor appears after you stop typing characters) (unfortunately when 
I tried to verify how it behaves on secondary head of matrox (which does not
have hardware cursor), I made a typo and ...

Unable to handle kernel NULL pointer dereference at virtual address 00000196
 printing eip:
c02f9258
*pde = 00000000
Oops: 0000
CPU:    0
EIP:    0060:[<c02f9258>]    Tainted: PFS
EFLAGS: 00010202
EIP is at fb_open+0x28/0xf0
eax: c6ed2c30   ebx: 00000020   ecx: 00000001   edx: c04848e0
esi: 00000002   edi: 00000000   ebp: c6ed2c30   esp: c4bb3f18
ds: 007b   es: 007b   ss: 0068
Process con2fb (pid: 18180, threadinfo=c4bb2000 task=d874d940)
Stack: 00000006 c8a8aae4 c4bb2000 00000000 c8a8aae4 c01669ea c6ed2c30 c8a8aae4
       dffe6830 c01435e3 c8a8aae4 c6ed2c30 dffe6830 00000000 c015af91 c6ed2c30
       c8a8aae4 00000002 bffffe7a dcaa5000 c4bb2000 c015adb7 ca74978c dffe6830
Call Trace:
 [<c01669ea>] chrdev_open+0xaa/0x110
 [<c01435e3>] file_ra_state_init+0x23/0x40
 [<c015af91>] dentry_open+0x1d1/0x1f0
 [<c015adb7>] filp_open+0x67/0x70
 [<c015b26b>] sys_open+0x5b/0x90
 [<c0109983>] syscall_call+0x7/0xb

Code: 8b 86 94 01 00 00 b9 01 00 00 00 8b 10 85 d2 74 1c b8 00 e0

so I'll have to check it tomorrow on real dualhead system...)

						Petr Vandrovec
						[e-mail]