ABI Interface

Argument Passing

Arguments are passed in both registers and memory. The first six incoming arguments are stored in registers a2 through a7, and additional arguments are stored on the stack starting at the current stack pointer a1. Because Xtensa uses register windows that rotate during a function call, outgoing arguments that will become the incoming arguments must be stored to different register numbers. Depending on the call instruction and, thus, the rotation of the register window, the arguments are passed starting starting with register a(2+N), where N is the size of the window rotation. Therefore, the first argument in case of a call4 instruction is placed into a6, and for a call8 instruction into a10. Large arguments (8-bytes) are always passed in an even/odd register pair even if that means to omit a register for alignment. The return values are stored in a2 through a7.

          return addr  stack ptr       arg0, arg1, arg2, arg3, arg4, arg5
          -----------  ---------       ----------------------------------
            a0           a1              a2,   a3,   a4,   a5,   a6,   a7

call4       a4           a5              a6,   a7,   a8,   a9,  a10,  a11
call8       a8           a9             a10,  a11,  a12,  a13,  a14,  a15
call12     a12          a13             a14,  a15   ---   ---   ---   --- 

Syscall ABI

Linux takes system-call arguments in registers. The ABI and Xtensa software conventions require the system-call number in a2. For improved efficiency, we try not to shift all parameters one register up to maintain the original order. Register a2 is, therefore, moved to a6, a6 to a8, and a7 to a9, if the system call requires these arguments.

syscall number               arg0, arg1, arg2, arg3, arg4, arg5
--------------               ----------------------------------
a2                           a6,   a3,   a4,   a5,   a8,   a9

Upon return, a2 contains the return value. A value of -1 indicates an error and the error code (errno) is stored in a3. All other registers are preserved.