Protected Procedure Handlers
Author: JTC1/SC22/WG9/ARG, by Randall Brukardt, ARG Editor

Ada Reference Manual — Legal Information

# C.3.1 Protected Procedure Handlers

Paragraphs 1 through 6 were moved to Annex J, “Obsolescent Features”.

#### Static Semantics

6.1/3
For a parameterless protected procedure, the following language-defined representation aspects may be specified:
6.2/3
Interrupt_Handler
The type of aspect Interrupt_Handler is Boolean. If directly specified, the aspect_definition shall be a static expression. This aspect is never inherited; if not directly specified, the aspect is False.
6.3/3
Attach_Handler
The aspect Attach_Handler is an expression, which shall be of type Interrupts.Interrupt_Id. This aspect is never inherited.

#### Legality Rules

7/3
If either the Attach_Handler or Interrupt_Handler aspect are specified for a protected procedure, the corresponding protected_type_declaration or single_protected_declaration shall be a library-level declaration and shall not be declared within a generic body. In addition to the places where Legality Rules normally apply (see 12.3), this rule also applies in the private part of an instance of a generic unit.
8/3
This paragraph was deleted.

#### Dynamic Semantics

9/3
If the Interrupt_Handler aspect of a protected procedure is True, then the procedure may be attached dynamically, as a handler, to interrupts (see C.3.2). Such procedures are allowed to be attached to multiple interrupts.
10/3
The expression specified for the Attach_Handler aspect of a protected procedure P is evaluated as part of the creation of the protected object that contains P. The value of the expression identifies an interrupt. As part of the initialization of that object, P (the handler procedure) is attached to the identified interrupt. A check is made that the corresponding interrupt is not reserved. Program_Error is raised if the check fails, and the existing treatment for the interrupt is not affected.
11/3
If the Ceiling_Locking policy (see D.3) is in effect, then upon the initialization of a protected object that contains a protected procedure for which either the Attach_Handler aspect is specified or the Interrupt_Handler aspect is True, a check is made that the initial ceiling priority of the object is in the range of System.Interrupt_Priority. If the check fails, Program_Error is raised.
12/3
When a protected object is finalized, for any of its procedures that are attached to interrupts, the handler is detached. If the handler was attached by a procedure in the Interrupts package or if no user handler was previously attached to the interrupt, the default treatment is restored. If the Attach_Handler aspect was specified and the most recently attached handler for the same interrupt is the same as the one that was attached at the time the protected object was initialized, the previous handler is restored.
13
When a handler is attached to an interrupt, the interrupt is blocked (subject to the Implementation Permission in C.3) during the execution of every protected action on the protected object containing the handler.

#### Erroneous Execution

14
If the Ceiling_Locking policy (see D.3) is in effect and an interrupt is delivered to a handler, and the interrupt hardware priority is higher than the ceiling priority of the corresponding protected object, the execution of the program is erroneous.
14.1/3
If the handlers for a given interrupt attached via aspect Attach_Handler are not attached and detached in a stack-like (LIFO) order, program execution is erroneous. In particular, when a protected object is finalized, the execution is erroneous if any of the procedures of the protected object are attached to interrupts via aspect Attach_Handler and the most recently attached handler for the same interrupt is not the same as the one that was attached at the time the protected object was initialized.

#### Metrics

15
The following metric shall be documented by the implementation:
16/2
The worst-case overhead for an interrupt handler that is a parameterless protected procedure, in clock cycles. This is the execution time not directly attributable to the handler procedure or the interrupted execution. It is estimated as C – (A+B), where A is how long it takes to complete a given sequence of instructions without any interrupt, B is how long it takes to complete a normal call to a given protected procedure, and C is how long it takes to complete the same sequence of instructions when it is interrupted by one execution of the same procedure called via an interrupt.

#### Implementation Permissions

17/3
When the aspects Attach_Handler or Interrupt_Handler are specified for a protected procedure, the implementation is allowed to impose implementation-defined restrictions on the corresponding protected_type_declaration and protected_body.
18
An implementation may use a different mechanism for invoking a protected procedure in response to a hardware interrupt than is used for a call to that protected procedure from a task.
19/3
Notwithstanding what this subclause says elsewhere, the Attach_Handler and Interrupt_Handler aspects are allowed to be used for other, implementation defined, forms of interrupt handlers.

#### Implementation Advice

20
Whenever possible, the implementation should allow interrupt handlers to be called directly by the hardware.
21
Whenever practical, the implementation should detect violations of any implementation-defined restrictions before run time.
NOTES
22/3
4 The Attach_Handler aspect may provide static attachment of handlers to interrupts if the implementation supports preelaboration of protected objects. (See C.4.)
23/2
5 A protected object that has a (protected) procedure attached to an interrupt should have a ceiling priority at least as high as the highest processor priority at which that interrupt will ever be delivered.
24
6 Protected procedures can also be attached dynamically to interrupts via operations declared in the predefined package Interrupts.
25
7 An example of a possible implementation-defined restriction is disallowing the use of the standard storage pools within the body of a protected procedure that is an interrupt handler.

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