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34 .Nd Architecture-specific details
36 Differences between CPU architectures and platforms supported by
39 This document is a quick reference of key ABI details of
42 For full details consult the processor-specific ABI supplement
45 If not explicitly mentioned, sizes are in bytes.
46 The architecture details in this document apply to
48 and later, unless otherwise noted.
51 uses a flat address space.
57 and pointers all have the same representation.
59 In order to maximize compatibility with future pointer integrity mechanisms,
60 manipulations of pointers as integers should be performed via
71 On some architectures, e.g.,
76 the kernel uses a separate address space.
77 On other architectures, kernel and a user mode process share a
79 The kernel is located at the highest addresses.
81 On each architecture, the main user mode thread's stack starts near
82 the highest user address and grows down.
85 architecture support varies by release.
86 This table shows the first
88 release to support each architecture, and, for discontinued
89 architectures, the final release.
91 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy Initial Release" "Sy Final Release"
92 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy Initial Release Ta Sy Final Release
94 .It alpha Ta 3.2 Ta 6.4
96 .It arm Ta 6.0 Ta 12.x
97 .It armeb Ta 8.0 Ta 11.x
100 .It ia64 Ta 5.0 Ta 10.4
109 .It mips64elhf Ta 12.0
111 .It pc98 Ta 2.2 Ta 11.x
113 .It powerpcspe Ta 12.0
116 .It riscv64sf Ta 12.0
117 .It sparc64 Ta 5.0 Ta 12.x
122 architectures use some variant of the ELF (see
124 .Sy Application Binary Interface
125 (ABI) for the machine processor.
126 All supported ABIs can be divided into two groups:
127 .Bl -tag -width "Dv ILP32"
132 types machine representations all have 4-byte size.
135 type machine representation uses 4 bytes,
144 symbol when compiling for an
148 Some machines support more that one
151 Typically these are 64-bit machines, where the
154 execution environment is accompanied by the
157 environment, which was historical 32-bit predecessor for 64-bit evolution.
159 .Bl -column -offset indent "Dv powerpc64" "Sy ILP32 counterpart"
160 .It Sy LP64 Ta Sy ILP32 counterpart
161 .It Dv amd64 Ta Dv i386
162 .It Dv powerpc64 Ta Dv powerpc
163 .It Dv mips64* Ta Dv mips*
164 .It Dv aarch64 Ta Dv armv6/armv7
167 will support execution of
171 binaries if the CPU implements
173 execution state, however
175 binaries aren't supported.
177 On all supported architectures:
178 .Bl -column -offset -indent "long long" "Size"
179 .It Sy Type Ta Sy Size
182 .It long Ta sizeof(void*)
187 Integers are represented in two's complement.
188 Alignment of integer and pointer types is natural, that is,
189 the address of the variable must be congruent to zero modulo the type size.
190 Most ILP32 ABIs, except
192 require only 4-byte alignment for 64-bit integers.
194 Machine-dependent type sizes:
195 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy void *" "Sy long double" "Sy time_t"
196 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy void * Ta Sy long double Ta Sy time_t
197 .It aarch64 Ta 8 Ta 16 Ta 8
198 .It amd64 Ta 8 Ta 16 Ta 8
199 .It arm Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
200 .It armv6 Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
201 .It i386 Ta 4 Ta 12 Ta 4
202 .It mips Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
203 .It mipsel Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
204 .It mipselhf Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
205 .It mipshf Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
206 .It mipsn32 Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
207 .It mips64 Ta 8 Ta 8 Ta 8
208 .It mips64el Ta 8 Ta 8 Ta 8
209 .It mips64elhf Ta 8 Ta 8 Ta 8
210 .It mips64hf Ta 8 Ta 8 Ta 8
211 .It powerpc Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
212 .It powerpcspe Ta 4 Ta 8 Ta 8
213 .It powerpc64 Ta 8 Ta 8 Ta 8
214 .It riscv64 Ta 8 Ta 16 Ta 8
215 .It riscv64sf Ta 8 Ta 16 Ta 8
216 .It sparc64 Ta 8 Ta 16 Ta 8
220 is 8 bytes on all supported architectures except i386.
221 .Ss Endianness and Char Signedness
222 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy Endianness" "Sy char Signedness"
223 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy Endianness Ta Sy char Signedness
224 .It aarch64 Ta little Ta unsigned
225 .It amd64 Ta little Ta signed
226 .It arm Ta little Ta unsigned
227 .It armv6 Ta little Ta unsigned
228 .It armv7 Ta little Ta unsigned
229 .It i386 Ta little Ta signed
230 .It mips Ta big Ta signed
231 .It mipsel Ta little Ta signed
232 .It mipselhf Ta little Ta signed
233 .It mipshf Ta big Ta signed
234 .It mipsn32 Ta big Ta signed
235 .It mips64 Ta big Ta signed
236 .It mips64el Ta little Ta signed
237 .It mips64elhf Ta little Ta signed
238 .It mips64hf Ta big Ta signed
239 .It powerpc Ta big Ta unsigned
240 .It powerpcspe Ta big Ta unsigned
241 .It powerpc64 Ta big Ta unsigned
242 .It riscv64 Ta little Ta signed
243 .It riscv64sf Ta little Ta signed
244 .It sparc64 Ta big Ta signed
247 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy Page Sizes"
248 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy Page Sizes
249 .It aarch64 Ta 4K, 2M, 1G
250 .It amd64 Ta 4K, 2M, 1G
254 .It i386 Ta 4K, 2M (PAE), 4M
272 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy float, double" "Sy long double"
273 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy float, double Ta Sy long double
274 .It aarch64 Ta hard Ta soft, quad precision
275 .It amd64 Ta hard Ta hard, 80 bit
276 .It arm Ta soft Ta soft, double precision
277 .It armv6 Ta hard(1) Ta hard, double precision
278 .It armv7 Ta hard(1) Ta hard, double precision
279 .It i386 Ta hard Ta hard, 80 bit
280 .It mips Ta soft Ta identical to double
281 .It mipsel Ta soft Ta identical to double
282 .It mipselhf Ta hard Ta identical to double
283 .It mipshf Ta hard Ta identical to double
284 .It mipsn32 Ta soft Ta identical to double
285 .It mips64 Ta soft Ta identical to double
286 .It mips64el Ta soft Ta identical to double
287 .It mips64elhf Ta hard Ta identical to double
288 .It mips64hf Ta hard Ta identical to double
289 .It powerpc Ta hard Ta hard, double precision
290 .It powerpcspe Ta hard Ta hard, double precision
291 .It powerpc64 Ta hard Ta hard, double precision
292 .It riscv64 Ta hard Ta hard, double precision
293 .It riscv64sf Ta soft Ta soft, double precision
294 .It sparc64 Ta hard Ta hard, quad precision
299 armv6 used the softfp ABI even though it supported only processors
300 with a floating point unit.
301 .Ss Default Tool Chain
302 .Fx uses a variety of tool chain components for the supported CPU
307 provided by the base system,
312 or an external toolchain compiler and linker provided by a port or package.
313 This table shows the default tool chain for each architecture.
314 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy Compiler" "Sy Linker"
315 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy Compiler Ta Sy Linker
316 .It aarch64 Ta Clang Ta lld
317 .It amd64 Ta Clang Ta lld
318 .It arm Ta Clang Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
319 .It armv6 Ta Clang Ta lld
320 .It armv7 Ta Clang Ta lld
321 .It i386 Ta Clang Ta lld
322 .It mips Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
323 .It mipsel Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
324 .It mipselhf Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
325 .It mipshf Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
326 .It mipsn32 Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
327 .It mips64 Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
328 .It mips64el Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
329 .It mips64elhf Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
330 .It mips64hf Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
331 .It powerpc Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
332 .It powerpcspe Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
333 .It powerpc64 Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
334 .It riscv64 Ta GCC(1) Ta GNU ld(1)
335 .It riscv64sf Ta GCC(1) Ta GNU ld(1)
336 .It sparc64 Ta GCC 4.2.1 Ta GNU ld 2.17.50
339 (1) External toolchain provided by ports/packages.
341 Note that GCC 4.2.1 is deprecated, and scheduled for removal on 2020-03-31.
342 Any CPU architectures not migrated by then
343 (to either base system Clang or external toolchain)
344 may be removed from the tree after that date.
345 Unless the make variable
346 .Dv MAKE_OBSOLETE_GCC
347 is defined, make universe will not build mips, powerpc, nor sparc64
348 architectures unless the xtoolchain binaries have been installed for
350 .Ss MACHINE_ARCH vs MACHINE_CPUARCH vs MACHINE
352 should be preferred in Makefiles when the generic
353 architecture is being tested.
355 should be preferred when there is something specific to a particular type of
356 architecture where there is a choice of many, or could be a choice of many.
359 when referring to the kernel, interfaces dependent on a specific type of kernel
360 or similar things like boot sequences.
361 .Bl -column -offset indent "Dv MACHINE" "Dv MACHINE_CPUARCH" "Dv MACHINE_ARCH"
362 .It Dv MACHINE Ta Dv MACHINE_CPUARCH Ta Dv MACHINE_ARCH
363 .It arm64 Ta aarch64 Ta aarch64
364 .It amd64 Ta amd64 Ta amd64
365 .It arm Ta arm Ta arm, armv6, armv7
366 .It i386 Ta i386 Ta i386
367 .It mips Ta mips Ta mips, mipsel, mips64, mips64el, mipshf, mipselhf, mips64elhf, mipsn32
368 .It powerpc Ta powerpc Ta powerpc, powerpcspe, powerpc64
369 .It riscv Ta riscv Ta riscv64, riscv64sf
370 .It sparc64 Ta sparc64 Ta sparc64
372 .Ss Predefined Macros
373 The compiler provides a number of predefined macros.
374 Some of these provide architecture-specific details and are explained below.
375 Other macros, including those required by the language standard, are not
378 The full set of predefined macros can be obtained with this command:
379 .Bd -literal -offset indent
380 cc -x c -dM -E /dev/null
383 Common type size and endianness macros:
384 .Bl -column -offset indent "BYTE_ORDER" "Sy Meaning"
385 .It Sy Macro Ta Sy Meaning
386 .It Dv __LP64__ Ta 64-bit (8-byte) long and pointer, 32-bit (4-byte) int
387 .It Dv __ILP32__ Ta 32-bit (4-byte) int, long and pointer
388 .It Dv BYTE_ORDER Ta Either Dv BIG_ENDIAN or Dv LITTLE_ENDIAN .
394 Architecture-specific macros:
395 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Architecture" "Sy Predefined macros"
396 .It Sy Architecture Ta Sy Predefined macros
397 .It aarch64 Ta Dv __aarch64__
398 .It amd64 Ta Dv __amd64__, Dv __x86_64__
399 .It arm Ta Dv __arm__
400 .It armv6 Ta Dv __arm__, Dv __ARM_ARCH >= 6
401 .It armv7 Ta Dv __arm__, Dv __ARM_ARCH >= 7
402 .It i386 Ta Dv __i386__
403 .It mips Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __MIPSEB__, Dv __mips_o32
404 .It mipsel Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __mips_o32
405 .It mipselhf Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __mips_o32
406 .It mipshf Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __MIPSEB__, Dv __mips_o32
407 .It mipsn32 Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __MIPSEB__, Dv __mips_n32
408 .It mips64 Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __MIPSEB__, Dv __mips_n64
409 .It mips64el Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __mips_n64
410 .It mips64elhf Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __mips_n64
411 .It mips64hf Ta Dv __mips__, Dv __MIPSEB__, Dv __mips_n64
412 .It powerpc Ta Dv __powerpc__
413 .It powerpcspe Ta Dv __powerpc__, Dv __SPE__
414 .It powerpc64 Ta Dv __powerpc__, Dv __powerpc64__
415 .It riscv64 Ta Dv __riscv, Dv __riscv_xlen == 64
416 .It riscv64sf Ta Dv __riscv, Dv __riscv_xlen == 64
417 .It sparc64 Ta Dv __sparc64__
420 Compilers may define additional variants of architecture-specific macros.
421 The macros above are preferred for use in
423 .Ss Important Xr make 1 variables
424 Most of the externally settable variables are defined in the
427 These variables are not otherwise documented and are used extensively
429 .Bl -column -offset indent "Sy Variable" "Sy Meaning and usage"
430 .It Dv MACHINE Represent the hardware platform.
431 This is the same as the native platform's
435 It defines both the userland / kernel interface, as well as the
436 bootloader / kernel interface.
437 It should only be used in these contexts.
438 Each CPU architecture may have multiple hardware platforms it supports
442 It is used to collect together all the files from
445 It is often the same as
447 just as one CPU architecture can be implemented by many different
448 hardware platforms, one hardware platform may support multiple CPU
449 architecture family members, though with different binaries.
452 of i386 supported the IBM-AT hardware platform while the
454 of pc98 supported the Japanese company NEC's PC-9801 and PC-9821
456 Both of these hardware platforms supported only the
458 of i386 where they shared a common ABI, except for certain kernel /
459 userland interfaces relating to underlying hardware platform
460 differences in bus architecture, device enumeration and boot interface.
463 should only be used in src/sys and src/stand or in system imagers or
465 .It Dv MACHINE_ARCH Represents the CPU processor architecture.
466 This is the same as the native platforms
470 It defines the CPU instruction family supported.
471 It may also encode a variation in the byte ordering of multi-byte
473 It may also encode a variation in the size of the integer or pointer.
474 It may also encode a ISA revision.
475 It may also encode hard versus soft floating point ABI and usage.
476 It may also encode a variant ABI when the other factors do not
477 uniquely define the ABI (e.g., MIPS' n32 ABI).
480 defines the ABI used by the system.
481 For example, the MIPS CPU processor family supports 9 different
482 combinations encoding pointer size, endian and hard versus soft float (for
483 8 combinations) as well as N32 (which only ever had one variation of
485 Generally, the plain CPU name specifies the most common (or at least
486 first) variant of the CPU.
487 This is why mips and mips64 imply 'big endian' while 'arm' and 'armv7'
489 If we ever were to support the so-called x32 ABI (using 32-bit
490 pointers on the amd64 architecture), it would most likely be encoded
492 It is unfortunate that amd64 specifies the 64-bit evolution of the x86
493 platform (it matches the 'first rule') as everybody else uses x86_64.
494 There is no standard name for the processor: each OS selects its own
496 .It Dv MACHINE_CPUARCH Represents the source location for a given
498 It is generally the common prefix for all the MACHINE_ARCH that
499 share the same implementation, though 'riscv' breaks this rule.
502 is defined to be mips for all the flavors of mips that we support
503 since we support them all with a shared set of sources.
504 While amd64 and i386 are closely related, MACHINE_CPUARCH is not x86
506 The FreeBSD source base supports amd64 and i386 with two
507 distinct source bases living in subdirectories named amd64 and i386
508 (though behind the scenes there's some sharing that fits into this
510 .It Dv CPUTYPE Sets the flavor of
513 It is used to optimize the build for a specific CPU / core that the
515 Generally, this does not change the ABI, though it can be a fine line
516 between optimization for specific cases.
517 .It Dv TARGET Used to set
519 in the top level Makefile for cross building.
520 Unused outside of that scope.
521 It is not passed down to the rest of the build.
522 Makefiles outside of the top level should not use it at all (though
523 some have their own private copy for hysterical raisons).
524 .It Dv TARGET_ARCH Used to set
526 by the top level Makefile for cross building.
528 .Dv TARGET , it is unused outside of that scope.
536 manual page appeared in