attempt to capture recent discussion about overflow and inbounds geps.

git-svn-id: https://llvm.org/svn/llvm-project/llvm/trunk@125412 91177308-0d34-0410-b5e6-96231b3b80d8
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Chris Lattner 2011-02-11 21:50:52 +00:00
parent b6c8cb4422
commit 776b7df0e7

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@ -598,13 +598,27 @@ idx3 = (char*) &MyVar + 8
<a name="overflow"><b>What happens if a GEP computation overflows?</b></a>
</div>
<div class="doc_text">
<p>If the GEP has the <tt>inbounds</tt> keyword, the result value is
undefined.</p>
<p>If the GEP lacks the <tt>inbounds</tt> keyword, the value is the result
from evaluating the implied two's complement integer computation. However,
since there's no guarantee of where an object will be allocated in the
address space, such values have limited meaning.</p>
<p>Otherwise, the result value is the result from evaluating the implied
two's complement integer computation. However, since there's no
guarantee of where an object will be allocated in the address space,
such values have limited meaning.</p>
<p>If the GEP has the <tt>inbounds</tt> keyword, the result value is
undefined (a "<a href="LangRef.html#trapvalues">trap value</a>") if the GEP
overflows (i.e. wraps around the end of the address space).</p>
<p>As such, there are some ramifications of this for inbounds GEPs: scales
implied by array/vector/pointer indices are always known to be "nsw" since
they are signed values that are scaled by the element size. These values
are also allowed to be negative (e.g. "gep i32 *%P, i32 -1") but the
pointer itself is logically treated as an unsigned value. This means that
GEPs have an asymmetric relation between the pointer base (which is treated
as unsigned) and the offset applied to it (which is treated as signed). The
result of the additions within the offset calculation cannot have signed
overflow, but when applied to the base pointer, there can be signed
overflow.
</p>
</div>