kbuild: Make $(LLVM) more flexible

The LLVM make variable allows a developer to quickly switch between the
GNU and LLVM tools. However, it does not handle versioned binaries, such
as the ones shipped by Debian, as LLVM=1 just defines the tool variables
with the unversioned binaries.

There was some discussion during the review of the patch that introduces
LLVM=1 around versioned binaries, ultimately coming to the conclusion
that developers can just add the folder that contains the unversioned
binaries to their PATH, as Debian's versioned suffixed binaries are
really just symlinks to the unversioned binaries in /usr/lib/llvm-#/bin:

$ realpath /usr/bin/clang-14
/usr/lib/llvm-14/bin/clang

$ PATH=/usr/lib/llvm-14/bin:$PATH make ... LLVM=1

However, that can be cumbersome to developers who are constantly testing
series with different toolchains and versions. It is simple enough to
support these versioned binaries directly in the Kbuild system by
allowing the developer to specify the version suffix with LLVM=, which
is shorter than the above suggestion:

$ make ... LLVM=-14

It does not change the meaning of LLVM=1 (which will continue to use
unversioned binaries) and it does not add too much additional complexity
to the existing $(LLVM) code, while allowing developers to quickly test
their series with different versions of the whole LLVM suite of tools.

Some developers may build LLVM from source but not add the binaries to
their PATH, as they may not want to use that toolchain systemwide.
Support those developers by allowing them to supply the directory that
the LLVM tools are available in, as it is no more complex to support
than the version suffix change above.

$ make ... LLVM=/path/to/llvm/

Update and reorder the documentation to reflect these new additions.
At the same time, notate that LLVM=0 is not the same as just omitting it
altogether, which has confused people in the past.

Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20200317215515.226917-1-ndesaulniers@google.com/
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20220224151322.072632223@infradead.org/
Suggested-by: Masahiro Yamada <masahiroy@kernel.org>
Suggested-by: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org>
Signed-off-by: Nathan Chancellor <nathan@kernel.org>
Reviewed-by: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>
Reviewed-by: Nick Desaulniers <ndesaulniers@google.com>
Signed-off-by: Masahiro Yamada <masahiroy@kernel.org>

1 files changed, 25 insertions, 6 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/kbuild/llvm.rst b/Documentation/kbuild/llvm.rst
index d32616891dcf..b854bb413164 100644
--- a/Documentation/kbuild/llvm.rst
+++ b/Documentation/kbuild/llvm.rst
@@ -49,17 +49,36 @@ example: ::
 LLVM Utilities
 --------------
 
-LLVM has substitutes for GNU binutils utilities. Kbuild supports ``LLVM=1``
-to enable them. ::
-
-	make LLVM=1
-
-They can be enabled individually. The full list of the parameters: ::
+LLVM has substitutes for GNU binutils utilities. They can be enabled individually.
+The full list of supported make variables::
 
 	make CC=clang LD=ld.lld AR=llvm-ar NM=llvm-nm STRIP=llvm-strip \
 	  OBJCOPY=llvm-objcopy OBJDUMP=llvm-objdump READELF=llvm-readelf \
 	  HOSTCC=clang HOSTCXX=clang++ HOSTAR=llvm-ar HOSTLD=ld.lld
 
+To simplify the above command, Kbuild supports the ``LLVM`` variable::
+
+	make LLVM=1
+
+If your LLVM tools are not available in your PATH, you can supply their
+location using the LLVM variable with a trailing slash::
+
+	make LLVM=/path/to/llvm/
+
+which will use ``/path/to/llvm/clang``, ``/path/to/llvm/ld.lld``, etc.
+
+If your LLVM tools have a version suffix and you want to test with that
+explicit version rather than the unsuffixed executables like ``LLVM=1``, you
+can pass the suffix using the ``LLVM`` variable::
+
+	make LLVM=-14
+
+which will use ``clang-14``, ``ld.lld-14``, etc.
+
+``LLVM=0`` is not the same as omitting ``LLVM`` altogether, it will behave like
+``LLVM=1``. If you only wish to use certain LLVM utilities, use their respective
+make variables.
+
 The integrated assembler is enabled by default. You can pass ``LLVM_IAS=0`` to
 disable it.