I'm also not clear on how specifying the alignment here helps since any object created in a way that the alignment would affect cannot have the FAM present.the __aligned__(16) here used to save 128bit vector later.But it has no effect, right? The array member is offset an integer multiple of sixteen bytes from the start of the structure, so it is already aligned with respect to that, and the declaration adds no further padding (and if it did, common style in both Linux and musl is to explicate the padding). And the pointer to the structure comes from the kernel.
if no __aligned__(16),the struct sigcontext is 8 bytes align,even if the extcontext[]
is offset an integer multiple of 16 bytes from the start of struct sigcontext,it can only
ensure the extcontext[] is 8 bytes align. (just only when sigcontext is 16 bytes align,
extcontext[] can meet 16 bytes align.)
The only thing this alignment directive does is raise the alignment requirement of the structure up to sixteen, but that only possibly matters for variables of the structure type, be they automatic or program life time. But from here it is hard to see why the alignment should matter in either of those cases, since those would only possibly be local buffers of the kernel-provided mcontext. And the kernel provides the mcontext already with all the alignment it needs. I am not aware of any kernel API that receives a user provided mcontext. And even if there was one, the kernel would have to copy it into kernel space before doing anything with it, anyway.
this not need kernel API, in kernel, if task has pending signal, kernel save context
to ucontext(in user stack space), then return to userspace to signal handle, from
the third parameter of signal_handler, user can access the ucontext and mcontext.
libc and kernel access the same ucontext in user stack space.
void signal_handler (int sig, siginfo_t *info, void *ctx) {
ucontext_t *uc = ctx;
mcontext_t *mc = ctx->uc_mcontext;
}
And, BTW, if the alignment really is needed on the mcontext_t itself, it might be better to put the alignment tag on the type, not one of the members.
we need extcontext[] 16 bytes align for 128bit vector access, if put the alignment on mcontext_t itself,although it can also meet the 16 bytes align requirements of extcontext[] (the offset is an integer multiple of 16 bytes from the start of struct sigcontext),the meaning is not clear.
Ciao, Markus