Re: [PATCH 1/4] x86/entry/64: Fix irqflag tracing wrt context tracking

From: Borislav Petkov
Date: Sat Nov 07 2015 - 06:18:37 EST


On Fri, Nov 06, 2015 at 03:12:43PM -0800, Andy Lutomirski wrote:
> Paolo pointed out that enter_from_user_mode could be called while
> irqflags were traced as though IRQs were on.
>
> In principle, this could confuse lockdep. It doesn't cause any
> problems that I've seen in any configuration, but if I build with
> CONFIG_DEBUG_LOCKDEP=y, enable a nohz_full CPU, and add code like:
>
> if (irqs_disabled()) {
> spin_lock(&something);
> spin_unlock(&something);
> }
>
> to the top of enter_from_user_mode, then lockdep will complain
> without this fix. It seems that lockdep's irqflags sanity checks
> are too weak to detect this bug without forcing the issue.
>
> This patch adds one byte to normal kernels, and it's IMO a bit ugly.
> I haven't spotted a better way to do this yet, though. The issue is
> that we can't do TRACE_IRQS_OFF until after SWAPGS (if needed), but
> we're also supposed to do it before calling C code.

I would not mind to have that explanation in the code itself so that
people don't scratch heads why the duplicated TRACE_IRQS_OFF call.

--
Regards/Gruss,
Boris.

ECO tip #101: Trim your mails when you reply.
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