Re: [PATCH] tpm: require to compile as part of the kernel

From: Jarkko Sakkinen
Date: Fri Jun 29 2018 - 13:43:40 EST


On Fri, Jun 29, 2018 at 09:31:41AM -0600, Jason Gunthorpe wrote:
> On Fri, Jun 29, 2018 at 06:10:02PM +0300, Jarkko Sakkinen wrote:
> > Do not allow to compile TPM core as a module. TPM defines a root of
> > trust for integrity and keyring subsystems and should be always
> > available and not be loaded from the user space. There is no a
> > reasonable use case for a loadable module existing.
> >
> > Signed-off-by: Jarkko Sakkinen <jarkko.sakkinen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > ---
> > drivers/char/tpm/Kconfig | 2 +-
> > include/linux/tpm.h | 3 +--
> > 2 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)
>
> This doesn't really make sense..
>
> The kconfig method is that if IMA requires TPM it should declare so
> and TPM will become non-modular because IMA is non-modular.
>
> There are lots of legitimate use cases for TPM that don't involve IMA
> or keyring.

In what context would it make sense to have TPM core as a module? I
forgot to add RFC tag this patch. Did not meant to push it to
mainline but more to rise up the discussion.

/Jarkko