basic asm and memory clobbers - Proposed solution

[David Wohlferd]

I have solved the problem with my previous patch.  Here's the update 
(feedback welcome): http://www.LimeGreenSocks.com/gcc/24414g.zip

Based on my understanding from the previous thread, this patch now does 
what it needs to do (code-wise) to resolve this "basic asm and memory 
clobbers" issue.  As mentioned previously, this patch introduces a new 
warning (-Wonly-top-basic-asm), which is disabled by default.  When 
enabled, it triggers a warning for any basic asm inside a function, 
unless the function has the "naked" attribute.

An argument can be made that the default for this warning should be 
'enabled.'  Yes, this will break builds that use basic asm and -Werror, 
but it can easily be disabled with -Wno-only-top-basic-asm.  And if we 
don't enable it, no one is going to know the check is even available.  
Then hidden problems like the one Paul was just describing still won't 
be found, and optimizations will continue to have unexpected side 
effects.  OTOH, I can also see changing this to 'enabled' as more 
appropriate in the next phase 1.

Now that I'm done with the code fix, I'm working on an update to the 
docs.  Obviously they should be checked in as part of the code fix. I'm 
planning to actually use the word "deprecated" when describing the use 
of basic asm within functions.  Seems like a big step.

But there's no point in my proceeding any further until someone in 
authority agrees that this is the desired solution.  I'm not actually 
sure who that is, but further work is a waste of time if no one is 
prepared to approve it.

If you are that person, the questions to be answered are:

1) Is the idea of changing basic asm to "clobber everything" dead?
2) Is creating a warning for the use of "basic asm inside a function" 
the solution for this issue?
3) Should the warning be enabled by default in v6?
4) Should the warning be enabled by Wall or Wextra?
5) Should the v6 docs explicitly describe using "basic asm inside a 
function" as deprecated?

If you're looking for my recommendations, I would say: Yes, Yes, 
(reluctantly) No, No and Yes.

With this information in hand, I'll take a shot at finishing this off.

For something that started out as a simple 3 sentence doc patch, this 
sure has turned into a project...

dw