rcu: Remove SPARSE_RCU_POINTER Kconfig option

The sparse-based checking for non-RCU accesses to RCU-protected pointers
has been around for a very long time, and it is now the only type of
sparse-based checking that is optional.  This commit therefore makes
it unconditional.

Reported-by: Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Paul E. McKenney <paulmck@linux.vnet.ibm.com>
Cc: Fengguang Wu <fengguang.wu@intel.com>

Documentation/RCU/Design/Requirements/Requirements.html

@@ -559,9 +559,7 @@ The <tt>rcu_access_pointer()</tt> on line&nbsp;6 is similar to
 	For <tt>remove_gp_synchronous()</tt>, as long as all modifications
 	to <tt>gp</tt> are carried out while holding <tt>gp_lock</tt>,
 	the above optimizations are harmless.
-	However,
-	with <tt>CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER=y</tt>,
-	<tt>sparse</tt> will complain if you
+	However, <tt>sparse</tt> will complain if you
 	define <tt>gp</tt> with <tt>__rcu</tt> and then
 	access it without using
 	either <tt>rcu_access_pointer()</tt> or <tt>rcu_dereference()</tt>.
@@ -1978,9 +1976,8 @@ guard against mishaps and misuse:
 	and <tt>rcu_dereference()</tt>, perhaps (incorrectly)
 	substituting a simple assignment.
 	To catch this sort of error, a given RCU-protected pointer may be
-	tagged with <tt>__rcu</tt>, after which running sparse
-	with <tt>CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER=y</tt> will complain
-	about simple-assignment accesses to that pointer.
+	tagged with <tt>__rcu</tt>, after which sparse
+	will complain about simple-assignment accesses to that pointer.
 	Arnd Bergmann made me aware of this requirement, and also
 	supplied the needed
 	<a href="https://lwn.net/Articles/376011/">patch series</a>.

Documentation/RCU/checklist.txt

@@ -413,11 +413,11 @@ over a rather long period of time, but improvements are always welcome!
 	read-side critical sections.  It is the responsibility of the
 	RCU update-side primitives to deal with this.
 
-17.	Use CONFIG_PROVE_RCU, CONFIG_DEBUG_OBJECTS_RCU_HEAD, and the
-	__rcu sparse checks (enabled by CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER) to
-	validate your RCU code.  These can help find problems as follows:
+17.	Use CONFIG_PROVE_LOCKING, CONFIG_DEBUG_OBJECTS_RCU_HEAD, and the
+	__rcu sparse checks to validate your RCU code.	These can help
+	find problems as follows:
 
-	CONFIG_PROVE_RCU: check that accesses to RCU-protected data
+	CONFIG_PROVE_LOCKING: check that accesses to RCU-protected data
 		structures are carried out under the proper RCU
 		read-side critical section, while holding the right
 		combination of locks, or whatever other conditions

Documentation/dev-tools/sparse.rst

@@ -103,9 +103,3 @@ have already built it.
 
 The optional make variable CF can be used to pass arguments to sparse.  The
 build system passes -Wbitwise to sparse automatically.
-
-Checking RCU annotations
-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-RCU annotations are not checked by default.  To enable RCU annotation
-checks, include -DCONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER in your CF flags.

include/linux/compiler.h

@@ -17,11 +17,7 @@
 # define __release(x)	__context__(x,-1)
 # define __cond_lock(x,c)	((c) ? ({ __acquire(x); 1; }) : 0)
 # define __percpu	__attribute__((noderef, address_space(3)))
-#ifdef CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER
 # define __rcu		__attribute__((noderef, address_space(4)))
-#else /* CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER */
-# define __rcu
-#endif /* CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER */
 # define __private	__attribute__((noderef))
 extern void __chk_user_ptr(const volatile void __user *);
 extern void __chk_io_ptr(const volatile void __iomem *);

lib/Kconfig.debug

@@ -1306,21 +1306,6 @@ menu "RCU Debugging"
 config PROVE_RCU
 	def_bool PROVE_LOCKING
 
-config SPARSE_RCU_POINTER
-	bool "RCU debugging: sparse-based checks for pointer usage"
-	default n
-	help
-	 This feature enables the __rcu sparse annotation for
-	 RCU-protected pointers.  This annotation will cause sparse
-	 to flag any non-RCU used of annotated pointers.  This can be
-	 helpful when debugging RCU usage.  Please note that this feature
-	 is not intended to enforce code cleanliness; it is instead merely
-	 a debugging aid.
-
-	 Say Y to make sparse flag questionable use of RCU-protected pointers
-
-	 Say N if you are unsure.
-
 config TORTURE_TEST
 	tristate
 	default n

lib/Makefile

@@ -25,9 +25,6 @@ lib-y := ctype.o string.o vsprintf.o cmdline.o \
 	 earlycpio.o seq_buf.o siphash.o \
 	 nmi_backtrace.o nodemask.o win_minmax.o
 
-CFLAGS_radix-tree.o += -DCONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER
-CFLAGS_idr.o += -DCONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER
-
 lib-$(CONFIG_MMU) += ioremap.o
 lib-$(CONFIG_SMP) += cpumask.o
 lib-$(CONFIG_DMA_NOOP_OPS) += dma-noop.o

tools/testing/selftests/rcutorture/doc/TREE_RCU-kconfig.txt

@@ -74,10 +74,6 @@ CONFIG_TINY_RCU
 
 	These are controlled by CONFIG_PREEMPT and/or CONFIG_SMP.
 
-CONFIG_SPARSE_RCU_POINTER
-
-	Makes sense only for sparse runs, not for kernel builds.
-
 CONFIG_SRCU
 CONFIG_TASKS_RCU