A memory image can be described by an object file, but an object file
is more than a memory image. Also, it makes sense to manipulate a
memory image to, for instance, change how it's loaded into memory. That
takes on larger implications (relocations, the entry point, symbols,
etc.) when talking about the whole object file, and also modifies
aspects which may not need to change. For instance if an image needs
to be loaded into memory at addresses different from what's in the
object file, but other things like symbols need to stay unmodified.
Change-Id: Ia360405ffb2c1c48e0cc201ac0a0764357996a54
Reviewed-on: https://gem5-review.googlesource.com/c/public/gem5/+/21466
Tested-by: kokoro <noreply+kokoro@google.com>
Reviewed-by: Brandon Potter <Brandon.Potter@amd.com>
Maintainer: Gabe Black <gabeblack@google.com>
The ObjectFile class has hardcoded assumptions that there are three
segments, text, bss and data. There are some files which have one
"segment" like raw files, where the entire file's contents are
considered a single segment. There are also ELF files which can have
an arbitrary number of segments, and those segments can hold any
number of sections, including the text, data and/or bss sections.
Removing this assumption frees up some object file formats from having
to twist themselves to fit in that structure, possibly introducing
ambiguities when some segments may fulfill multiple roles.
Change-Id: I976e06a3a90ef852b17a6485e2595b006b2090d5
Reviewed-on: https://gem5-review.googlesource.com/c/public/gem5/+/21463
Tested-by: kokoro <noreply+kokoro@google.com>
Reviewed-by: Andreas Sandberg <andreas.sandberg@arm.com>
Maintainer: Gabe Black <gabeblack@google.com>
ELF is, in my opinion, the most important object file format gem5
currently understands, and in ELF terminolgy the blob of data that
needs to be loaded into memory to a particular location is called a
segment. A section is a software level view of what's in a region
of memory, and a single segment may contain multiple sections which
happen to follow each other in memory.
Change-Id: Ib810c5050723d5a96bd7550515b08ac695fb1b02
Reviewed-on: https://gem5-review.googlesource.com/c/public/gem5/+/21462
Tested-by: kokoro <noreply+kokoro@google.com>
Reviewed-by: Andreas Sandberg <andreas.sandberg@arm.com>
Maintainer: Gabe Black <gabeblack@google.com>
Libraries are loaded into the process address space using the
mmap system call. Conveniently, this happens to be a good
time to update the process symbol table with the library's
incoming symbols so we handle the table update from within the
system call.
This works just like an application's normal symbols. The only
difference between a dynamic library and a main executable is
when the symbol table update occurs. The symbol table update for
an executable happens at program load time and is finished before
the process ever begins executing. Since dynamic linking happens
at runtime, the symbol loading happens after the library is
first loaded into the process address space. The library binary
is examined at this time for a symbol section and that section
is parsed for symbol types with specific bindings (global,
local, weak). Subsequently, these symbols are added to the table
and are available for use by gem5 for things like trace
generation.
Checkpointing should work just as it did previously. The address
space (and therefore the library) will be recorded and the symbol
table will be entirely recorded. (It's not possible to do anything
clever like checkpoint a program and then load the program back
with different libraries with LD_LIBRARY_PATH, because the
library becomes part of the address space after being loaded.)
All the object loaders directly examine the (already completely loaded
by object_file.cc) memory image. There is no current motivation to
keep the fd around.
