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Lecture Slides 06 065-Structsalign

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0 views10 pages

Lecture Slides 06 065-Structsalign

Uploaded by

yihuangece
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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University of Washington

Section 5: Arrays & Other Data Structures


 Array allocation and access in memory
 Multi-dimensional or nested arrays
 Multi-level arrays
 Other structures in memory
 Data structures and alignment

Structures and Alignment


University of Washington

Structures & Alignment


 Unaligned Data struct
struct S1
S1 {{
char
char c;
c;
c i[0] i[1] v int
int i[2];
i[2];
p p+1 p+5 p+9 p+17 double
double v;v;
}} *p;
*p;
 Aligned Data
 Primitive data type requires K bytes
 Address must be multiple of K

c 3 bytes i[0] i[1] 4 bytes v


p+0 p+4 p+8 p+16 p+24

Multiple of 4 Multiple of 8

Multiple of Multiple of
8 Structures and Alignment
8
University of Washington

Alignment Principles
 Aligned Data
 Primitive data type requires K bytes
 Address must be multiple of K
 Aligned data is required on some machines; it is advised on IA32
 Treated differently by IA32 Linux, x86-64 Linux, and Windows!
 What is the motivation for alignment?

Structures and Alignment


University of Washington

Alignment Principles
 Aligned Data
 Primitive data type requires K bytes
 Address must be multiple of K
 Aligned data is required on some machines; it is advised on IA32
 Treated differently by IA32 Linux, x86-64 Linux, and Windows!
 Motivation for Aligning Data
 Physical memory is accessed by aligned chunks of 4 or 8 bytes (system-
dependent)
 Inefficient to load or store datum that spans quad word boundaries
 Also, virtual memory is very tricky when datum spans two pages (later…)
 Compiler
 Inserts padding in structure to ensure correct alignment of fields
 sizeof() should be used to get true size of structs

Structures and Alignment


University of Washington

Specific Cases of Alignment (IA32)


 1 byte: char, …
 no restrictions on address
 2 bytes: short, …
 lowest 1 bit of address must be 02
 4 bytes: int, float, char *, …
 lowest 2 bits of address must be 002
 8 bytes: double, …
 Windows (and most other OSs & instruction sets): lowest 3 bits 0002
 Linux: lowest 2 bits of address must be 002
 i.e., treated the same as a 4-byte primitive data type
 12 bytes: long double
 Windows, Linux: lowest 2 bits of address must be 002

Structures and Alignment


University of Washington

Satisfying Alignment with Structures


struct S1 {
 Within structure: char c;
 Must satisfy every member’s alignment requirement int i[2];
 Overall structure placement double v;
} *p1;
 Each structure has alignment requirement K
 K = Largest alignment of any element
 Initial address & structure length must be multiples of K
 Example (under Windows or x86-64): K = ?
 K = 8, due to double member

c 3 bytes i[0] i[1] 4 bytes v


p1+0 p1+4 p1+8 p1+16 p1+24

Multiple of 4 Multiple of 8

Multiple of 8 Multiple of 8
Structures and Alignment
University of Washington

Different Alignment Conventions


struct S1 {
 IA32 Windows or x86-64: char c;
int i[2];
 K = 8, due to double member double v;
} *p1;

c 3 bytes i[0] i[1] 4 bytes v


p1+0 p1+4 p1+8 p1+16 p1+24

 IA32 Linux: K = ?
 K = 4; double aligned like a 4-byte data type

c 3 bytes i[0] i[1] v


p1+0 p1+4 p1+8 p1+12 p1+20

Structures and Alignment


University of Washington

Saving Space
 Put large data types first:
struct S1 { struct S2 {
char c; double v;
int i[2]; int i[2];
double v; char c;
} *p1; } *p2;

 Effect (example x86-64, both have K=8)

c 3 bytes i[0] i[1] 4 bytes v


p1+0 p1+4 p1+8 p1+16 p1+24

Unfortunately, doesn’t
satisfy requirement
v i[0] i[1] c that struct’s total size
p2+0 p2+8 p2+16 is a multiple of K
Structures and Alignment
University of Washington

Arrays of Structures
 Satisfy alignment requirement struct S2 {
for every element double v;
int i[2];
char c;
} a[10];

a[0] a[1] a[2] •••


a+0 a+24 a+48 a+72

v i[0] i[1] c 7 bytes

a+24 a+32 a+40 a+48

Structures and Alignment


University of Washington

Accessing Array Elements // Global:


struct S3 {
short i;
 Compute array offset 12i (sizeof(S3)) float v;
short j;
 Element j is at offset 8 within structure } a[10];
 Since a is static array, assembler gives offset a+8

a[0] • • • a[i] • • •
a+0 a+12i

i 2 bytes v j 2 bytes

a+12i a+12i+8
short get_j(int idx)
{ # %eax = idx
return a[idx].j; leal (%eax,%eax,2),%eax # 3*idx
// return (a + idx)->j; movswl a+8(,%eax,4),%eax # a+12*idx+8
}
Structures and Alignment

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