Re: [kernel-hardening] [PATCH v5 1/4] gcc-plugins: Add the initify gcc plugin

From: Kees Cook
Date: Tue Mar 28 2017 - 15:03:18 EST


On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 12:49 AM, Arnd Bergmann <arnd@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 27, 2017 at 6:14 PM, Kees Cook <keescook@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> On Mon, Mar 27, 2017 at 12:38 AM, Andrew Donnellan
>> <andrew.donnellan@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>> On 01/02/17 07:24, Kees Cook wrote:
>>>>
>>>> From: Emese Revfy <re.emese@xxxxxxxxx>
>>>>
>>>> The kernel already has a mechanism to free up code and data memory that
>>>> is only used during kernel or module initialization. This plugin will
>>>> teach the compiler to find more such code and data that can be freed
>>>> after initialization.
>>>
>>>
>>> Currently checking whether we can wire this up for powerpc without too many
>>> problems...
>>
>> Cool, thanks. FWIW, note that this plugin is a bit back-burnered at
>> the moment. I've got this in my -next tree still, but it needs some
>> rather large changes to how it does its annotations before Linus will
>> accept it.
>
> I've tried turning it on again a few days ago and still got too many build
> problems with my randconfig tree, so I've turned it off again. I think I've
> already reported most of what I found now, so I did not send out new
> reports.

Hrm, with what's in -next? That's too bad. I thought everything you
reported had been fixed. Dang. :(

-Kees

--
Kees Cook
Pixel Security