Subject: [PATCH v3 4/4] mm: refresh ZONE_DMA and ZONE_DMA32 comments in 'enum zone_type'

From: Nicolas Saenz Julienne <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 2 Sep 2019 16:10:42 +0200

These zones usage has evolved with time and the comments were outdated.
This joins both ZONE_DMA and ZONE_DMA32 explanation and gives up to date
examples on how they are used on different architectures.

Signed-off-by: Nicolas Saenz Julienne <[email-masked]>
Reviewed-by: Christoph Hellwig <[email-masked]>

---

Changes in v3:
- Update comment to match changes in arm64

Changes in v2:
- Try another approach merging both ZONE_DMA comments into one
- Address Christoph's comments
- If this approach doesn't get much traction I'll just drop the patch
  from the series as it's not really essential

 include/linux/mmzone.h | 45 ++++++++++++++++++++++++------------------
 1 file changed, 26 insertions(+), 19 deletions(-)

diff --git a/include/linux/mmzone.h b/include/linux/mmzone.h
index 3f38c30d2f13..bf1b916c9ecb 100644
--- a/include/linux/mmzone.h
+++ b/include/linux/mmzone.h
@@ -357,33 +357,40 @@ struct per_cpu_nodestat {
 #endif /* !__GENERATING_BOUNDS.H */
 
 enum zone_type {
-#ifdef CONFIG_ZONE_DMA
 	/*
-	 * ZONE_DMA is used when there are devices that are not able
-	 * to do DMA to all of addressable memory (ZONE_NORMAL). Then we
-	 * carve out the portion of memory that is needed for these devices.
-	 * The range is arch specific.
+	 * ZONE_DMA and ZONE_DMA32 are used when there are peripherals not able
+	 * to DMA to all of the addressable memory (ZONE_NORMAL).
+	 * On architectures where this area covers the whole 32 bit address
+	 * space ZONE_DMA32 is used. ZONE_DMA is left for the ones with smaller
+	 * DMA addressing constraints. This distinction is important as a 32bit
+	 * DMA mask is assumed when ZONE_DMA32 is defined. Some 64-bit
+	 * platforms may need both zones as they support peripherals with
+	 * different DMA addressing limitations.
+	 *
+	 * Some examples:
+	 *
+	 *  - i386 and x86_64 have a fixed 16M ZONE_DMA and ZONE_DMA32 for the
+	 *    rest of the lower 4G.
+	 *
+	 *  - arm only uses ZONE_DMA, the size, up to 4G, may vary depending on
+	 *    the specific device.
+	 *
+	 *  - arm64 has a fixed 1G ZONE_DMA and ZONE_DMA32 for the rest of the
+	 *    lower 4G.
 	 *
-	 * Some examples
+	 *  - powerpc only uses ZONE_DMA, the size, up to 2G, may vary
+	 *    depending on the specific device.
 	 *
-	 * Architecture		Limit
-	 * ---------------------------
-	 * parisc, ia64, sparc	<4G
-	 * s390, powerpc	<2G
-	 * arm			Various
-	 * alpha		Unlimited or 0-16MB.
+	 *  - s390 uses ZONE_DMA fixed to the lower 2G.
 	 *
-	 * i386, x86_64 and multiple other arches
-	 * 			<16M.
+	 *  - ia64 and riscv only use ZONE_DMA32.
+	 *
+	 *  - parisc uses neither.
 	 */
+#ifdef CONFIG_ZONE_DMA
 	ZONE_DMA,
 #endif
 #ifdef CONFIG_ZONE_DMA32
-	/*
-	 * x86_64 needs two ZONE_DMAs because it supports devices that are
-	 * only able to do DMA to the lower 16M but also 32 bit devices that
-	 * can only do DMA areas below 4G.
-	 */
 	ZONE_DMA32,
 #endif
 	/*
-- 
2.23.0

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