kbuild: change working directory to external module directory with M=

Currently, Kbuild always operates in the output directory of the kernel,
even when building external modules. This increases the risk of external
module Makefiles attempting to write to the kernel directory.

This commit switches the working directory to the external module
directory, allowing the removal of the $(KBUILD_EXTMOD)/ prefix from
some build artifacts.

The command for building external modules maintains backward
compatibility, but Makefiles that rely on working in the kernel
directory may break. In such cases, $(objtree) and $(srctree) should
be used to refer to the output and source directories of the kernel.

The appearance of the build log will change as follows:

[Before]

  $ make -C /path/to/my/linux M=/path/to/my/externel/module
  make: Entering directory '/path/to/my/linux'
    CC [M]  /path/to/my/externel/module/helloworld.o
    MODPOST /path/to/my/externel/module/Module.symvers
    CC [M]  /path/to/my/externel/module/helloworld.mod.o
    CC [M]  /path/to/my/externel/module/.module-common.o
    LD [M]  /path/to/my/externel/module/helloworld.ko
  make: Leaving directory '/path/to/my/linux'

[After]

  $ make -C /path/to/my/linux M=/path/to/my/externel/module
  make: Entering directory '/path/to/my/linux'
  make[1]: Entering directory '/path/to/my/externel/module'
    CC [M]  helloworld.o
    MODPOST Module.symvers
    CC [M]  helloworld.mod.o
    CC [M]  .module-common.o
    LD [M]  helloworld.ko
  make[1]: Leaving directory '/path/to/my/externel/module'
  make: Leaving directory '/path/to/my/linux'

Printing "Entering directory" twice is cumbersome. This will be
addressed later.

Signed-off-by: Masahiro Yamada <masahiroy@kernel.org>
Reviewed-by: Nicolas Schier <n.schier@avm.de>

2 files changed, 21 insertions, 15 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/dev-tools/coccinelle.rst b/Documentation/dev-tools/coccinelle.rst
index 535ce126fb4f..6e70a1e9a3c0 100644
--- a/Documentation/dev-tools/coccinelle.rst
+++ b/Documentation/dev-tools/coccinelle.rst
@@ -250,25 +250,17 @@ variables for .cocciconfig is as follows:
 - Your directory from which spatch is called is processed next
 - The directory provided with the ``--dir`` option is processed last, if used
 
-Since coccicheck runs through make, it naturally runs from the kernel
-proper dir; as such the second rule above would be implied for picking up a
-.cocciconfig when using ``make coccicheck``.
-
 ``make coccicheck`` also supports using M= targets. If you do not supply
 any M= target, it is assumed you want to target the entire kernel.
 The kernel coccicheck script has::
 
-    if [ "$KBUILD_EXTMOD" = "" ] ; then
-        OPTIONS="--dir $srctree $COCCIINCLUDE"
-    else
-        OPTIONS="--dir $KBUILD_EXTMOD $COCCIINCLUDE"
-    fi
-
-KBUILD_EXTMOD is set when an explicit target with M= is used. For both cases
-the spatch ``--dir`` argument is used, as such third rule applies when whether
-M= is used or not, and when M= is used the target directory can have its own
-.cocciconfig file. When M= is not passed as an argument to coccicheck the
-target directory is the same as the directory from where spatch was called.
+    OPTIONS="--dir $srcroot $COCCIINCLUDE"
+
+Here, $srcroot refers to the source directory of the target: it points to the
+external module's source directory when M= used, and otherwise, to the kernel
+source directory. The third rule ensures the spatch reads the .cocciconfig from
+the target directory, allowing external modules to have their own .cocciconfig
+file.
 
 If not using the kernel's coccicheck target, keep the above precedence
 order logic of .cocciconfig reading. If using the kernel's coccicheck target,
diff --git a/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst b/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst
index 7964e0c245ae..d36519f194dc 100644
--- a/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst
+++ b/Documentation/kbuild/makefiles.rst
@@ -449,6 +449,20 @@ $(obj)
   to prerequisites are referenced with $(src) (because they are not
   generated files).
 
+$(srcroot)
+  $(srcroot) refers to the root of the source you are building, which can be
+  either the kernel source or the external modules source, depending on whether
+  KBUILD_EXTMOD is set. This can be either a relative or an absolute path, but
+  if KBUILD_ABS_SRCTREE=1 is set, it is always an absolute path.
+
+$(srctree)
+  $(srctree) refers to the root of the kernel source tree. When building the
+  kernel, this is the same as $(srcroot).
+
+$(objtree)
+  $(objtree) refers to the root of the kernel object tree. It is ``.`` when
+  building the kernel, but it is different when building external modules.
+
 $(kecho)
   echoing information to user in a rule is often a good practice
   but when execution ``make -s`` one does not expect to see any output