GCC ARM port and use of -fomit-frame-pointer

Kernel
1

anonymous wrote on Saturday, April 14, 2007:

I see the GCC ARM port issue regarding thread unsafe function returns is still biting people. I find the use of -fomit-frame-pointer interferes with some debuggers’ abilities to unwind the stack. Some time ago I suggested a FreeRTOS port fix for it. I have been using the fix successfully for some time now. It seems to take care of the issue. I think it should be in the official ARM port so that the problem doesn’t keep coming back.

Here it is again (without explanation):
In the portSAVE_CONTEXT() macro of portmacro.h add the commented line in the position shown below

____/* Set R0 to point to the task stack pointer. */ 
________"STMDB    SP,{SP}^            \n\t"
________"NOP                        \n\t"
________"SUB    SP, SP, #4          \n\t"
________"LDMIA    SP!,{R0}            \n\t"
                                         
/*gb - step over possible GCC stacked items (GCC bug)*/
________"SUB    R0, R0, #8          \n\t" \

2

nobody wrote on Thursday, April 19, 2007:

No response to this?  Looks like a good idea.

Does this mean it uses an extra 8 bytes of RAM for each context?  Should not be a problem I don’t think.

3

anonymous wrote on Thursday, April 19, 2007:

Yes, eight bytes of stack space are wasted for each task, except the running task (and except for those tasks that were in the non thread-safe state when their context was saved). Also, the cost of a context switch goes up by the execution of one register-to-register instruction.