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69<a name="g_t_002ep2align_005bwl_005d-_005babs_002dexpr_005b_002c-abs_002dexpr_005b_002c-abs_002dexpr_005d_005d_005d"></a>
70<h3 class="section">7.71 <code>.p2align[wl] [<var>abs-expr</var>[, <var>abs-expr</var>[, <var>abs-expr</var>]]]</code></h3>
71
72<a name="index-padding-the-location-counter-given-a-power-of-two"></a>
73<a name="index-p2align-directive"></a>
74<p>Pad the location counter (in the current subsection) to a particular
75storage boundary.  The first expression (which must be absolute) is the
76number of low-order zero bits the location counter must have after
77advancement.  For example &lsquo;<samp>.p2align 3</samp>&rsquo; advances the location
78counter until it is a multiple of 8.  If the location counter is already a
79multiple of 8, no change is needed.  If the expression is omitted then a
80default value of 0 is used, effectively disabling alignment requirements.
81</p>
82<p>The second expression (also absolute) gives the fill value to be stored in the
83padding bytes.  It (and the comma) may be omitted.  If it is omitted, the
84padding bytes are normally zero.  However, on most systems, if the section is
85marked as containing code and the fill value is omitted, the space is filled
86with no-op instructions.
87</p>
88<p>The third expression is also absolute, and is also optional.  If it is present,
89it is the maximum number of bytes that should be skipped by this alignment
90directive.  If doing the alignment would require skipping more bytes than the
91specified maximum, then the alignment is not done at all.  You can omit the
92fill value (the second argument) entirely by simply using two commas after the
93required alignment; this can be useful if you want the alignment to be filled
94with no-op instructions when appropriate.
95</p>
96<a name="index-p2alignw-directive"></a>
97<a name="index-p2alignl-directive"></a>
98<p>The <code>.p2alignw</code> and <code>.p2alignl</code> directives are variants of the
99<code>.p2align</code> directive.  The <code>.p2alignw</code> directive treats the fill
100pattern as a two byte word value.  The <code>.p2alignl</code> directives treats the
101fill pattern as a four byte longword value.  For example, <code>.p2alignw
1022,0x368d</code> will align to a multiple of 4.  If it skips two bytes, they will be
103filled in with the value 0x368d (the exact placement of the bytes depends upon
104the endianness of the processor).  If it skips 1 or 3 bytes, the fill value is
105undefined.
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