To: Matt Thomas <matt@3am-software.com>
From: Richard Earnshaw <rearnsha@arm.com>
List: port-arm32
Date: 02/25/2001 16:00:03
>
> The above file needs to be common between the arm platforms
> so that gdb support for kcore and kernel debugging can work.
> It would be nice if all registers could be contained in the
> pcb as that greatly simplifies gdb support.
Can we also ensure that there is enough space in this structure to save
the VFP context. This will require (at a minimum) space for 2 32-bit
control registers and 32 32-bit float registers (which can be used in
pairs to give 16 64-bit registers). Due to the way the VFP can dump its
registers with FSTMX we will also need 2 32-bit words of additional
storage in the fp-register bank. By my calculations that comes to 36
Words of storage.
The VFP also has one additional 32-bit register which is read-only. The
contents of this register will probably be needed by debuggers if they are
to analyse the crash dump. I guess it should also be stored in the pcb,
though its value will never change.
Assuming a process can either be enabled for VFP code or FPA code, but not
both, I guess we could overlay the information on the FPE status, and use
a control byte to tell us which is in use. [Do we want to make such an
assumption?]
R.