[PATCH] gas: Document @ and % as interchangeable for type argument in .section

[Will Hawkins]

On Sunday, May 17, 2026, Jan Beulich <jbeulich@suse.com> wrote:

> On 16.05.2026 02:38, Will Hawkins wrote:
> > In the .section Assembler Directive for the ELF format, both the % and
> > the @ can be used when writing the type argument.
>
> That's not exactly true (the two aren't fully interchangeable), and hence
> ...



In obj-elf.c, I saw

else if (c == '@' || c == '%')

which I must have misinterpreted?



>
> > Clarify the documentation.
> >
> > Signed-off-by: Will Hawkins <hawkinsw@obs.cr>
> > ---
> >  gas/doc/as.texi | 7 +++----
> >  1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)
> >
> > diff --git a/gas/doc/as.texi b/gas/doc/as.texi
> > index 3e1d2d0e254..201d9c26b7d 100644
> > --- a/gas/doc/as.texi
> > +++ b/gas/doc/as.texi
> > @@ -7118,13 +7118,12 @@ a numeric value to be set as the ELF section
> header's type field.
> >  some targets extend this list with their own types
> >  @end table
> >
> > +Note - the @code{%} character may be used instead of the @code{@@}
> character
> > +when writing the @var{type} argument constant.
> > +
> >  Many targets only support the first three section types.  The type may
> be
> >  enclosed in double quotes if necessary.
> >
> > -Note on targets where the @code{@@} character is the start of a
> comment (eg
> > -ARM) then another character is used instead.  For example the ARM port
> uses the
> > -@code{%} character.
>
> ... removing this paragraph loses information. I'd suggest adding
> something like
> "For example the Arm port uses @code{@@} as comment character." to the
> new paragraph
> you add. (MMIX is the other way around, using % as comment char.)
>
> Jan
>
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