Intel MPX

[Leandro T. C. Melo via Digitalmars-d]

2014-12-15 16:55 GMT-02:00 Paulo Pinto via Digitalmars-d <
digitalmars-d at puremagic.com>:
>
> On Monday, 15 December 2014 at 16:30:14 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:
>
>> Any thoughts on how the upcoming hardware supported bounds checking from
>> Intel will affect D?
>>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_MPX
>>
>> Chapter 9 in:
>>
>> https://software.intel.com/sites/default/files/managed/
>> 0d/53/319433-022.pdf
>>
>
> Interesting, given that bounds checking support is an old feature
>
> http://x86.renejeschke.de/html/file_module_x86_id_18.html
>
> If I remember my Assembly days in the 90's BOUND was slower than doing the
> check explicitly.
>
> I guess now it is way faster and the MMU is doing it instead.
>


​Actually, MPX provides a complete infra-structure for bounds-checking,
including special-purpose registers (4 of them), a bounds directory/tables
for storing/loading linearized pointer addresses, specific instructions to
independently make/check upper/lower bounds, and even modified versions of
call/ret/jump.

​They are working in the ABI level so calling conventions can benefit from
it. Although MPX currently supports only statically allocated arrays, a
memory-protected version of glibc is on the way​:
https://software.intel.com/en-us/blogs/2013/07/22/intel-memory-protection-extensions-intel-mpx-support-in-the-gnu-toolchain

​I've tried out the MPX-enabled GCC version and it looks pretty cool.
​
--
​Leandro​
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