From: John Hubbard <jhubbard@nvidia.com>
To: Jann Horn <jannh@google.com>, Michal Hocko <mhocko@kernel.org>
Cc: Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>,
Linux API <linux-api@vger.kernel.org>,
Khalid Aziz <khalid.aziz@oracle.com>,
Michael Ellerman <mpe@ellerman.id.au>,
Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>,
Russell King - ARM Linux <linux@armlinux.org.uk>,
Andrea Arcangeli <aarcange@redhat.com>,
linux-mm@kvack.org, LKML <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
linux-arch <linux-arch@vger.kernel.org>,
Florian Weimer <fweimer@redhat.com>,
Matthew Wilcox <willy@infradead.org>,
Mike Rapoport <rppt@linux.vnet.ibm.com>,
Cyril Hrubis <chrubis@suse.cz>, Pavel Machek <pavel@ucw.cz>,
Michal Hocko <mhocko@suse.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH 2/2] mmap.2: MAP_FIXED updated documentation
Date: Thu, 14 Dec 2017 15:06:56 -0800 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <b4fb7b3a-e53e-bf87-53c5-186751a14f4e@nvidia.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAG48ez0JZ3PVW3vgSXDmDijS+a_5bSX9qNuyggnsB6JTSkKngA@mail.gmail.com>
On 12/13/2017 06:52 PM, Jann Horn wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 13, 2017 at 10:31 AM, Michal Hocko <mhocko@kernel.org> wrote:
>> From: John Hubbard <jhubbard@nvidia.com>
[...]
>> +.IP
>> +Furthermore, this option is extremely hazardous (when used on its own), because
>> +it forcibly removes pre-existing mappings, making it easy for a multi-threaded
>> +process to corrupt its own address space.
>
> I think this is worded unfortunately. It is dangerous if used
> incorrectly, and it's a good tool when used correctly.
>
> [...]
>> +Thread B need not create a mapping directly; simply making a library call
>> +that, internally, uses
>> +.I dlopen(3)
>> +to load some other shared library, will
>> +suffice. The dlopen(3) call will map the library into the process's address
>> +space. Furthermore, almost any library call may be implemented using this
>> +technique.
>> +Examples include brk(2), malloc(3), pthread_create(3), and the PAM libraries
>> +(http://www.linux-pam.org).
>
> This is arkward. This first mentions dlopen(), which is a very niche
> case, and then just very casually mentions the much bigger
> problem that tons of library functions can allocate memory through
> malloc(), causing mmap() calls, sometimes without that even being
> a documented property of the function.
>
Hi Jann,
Here is some proposed new wording, to address your two comments above. What do
you think of this:
NOTE: this option can be hazardous (when used on its own), because it
forcibly removes pre-existing mappings, making it easy for a multi-
threaded process to corrupt its own address space. For example, thread A
looks through /proc/<pid>/maps and locates an available address range,
while thread B simultaneously acquires part or all of that same address
range. Thread A then calls mmap(MAP_FIXED), effectively overwriting the
mapping that thread B created.
Thread B need not create a mapping directly; simply making a library call
whose implementation calls malloc(3), mmap(), or dlopen(3) will suffice,
because those calls all create new mappings.
>> +.IP
>> +Newer kernels
>> +(Linux 4.16 and later) have a
>> +.B MAP_FIXED_SAFE
>> +option that avoids the corruption problem; if available, MAP_FIXED_SAFE
>> +should be preferred over MAP_FIXED.
>
> This is bad advice. MAP_FIXED is completely safe if you use it on an address
> range you've allocated, and it is used in this way by core system libraries to
> place multiple VMAs in virtually contiguous memory, for example:
[...]
> MAP_FIXED is a better solution for these usecases than MAP_FIXED_SAFE,
> or whatever it ends up being called. Please remove this advice or, better,
> clarify what MAP_FIXED should be used for (creation of virtually contiguous
> VMAs) and what MAP_FIXED_SAFE should be used for (attempting to
> allocate memory at a fixed address for some reason, with a failure instead of
> the normal fallback to using a different address).
>
Rather than risk another back-and-forth with Michal (who doesn't want any advice
on how to use this safely, in the man page), I've simply removed this advice
entirely.
thanks,
--
John Hubbard
NVIDIA
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next prev parent reply other threads:[~2017-12-14 23:07 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 52+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2017-12-13 9:25 [PATCH v2 0/2] mm: introduce MAP_FIXED_SAFE Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 9:25 ` [PATCH 1/2] " Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 12:50 ` Matthew Wilcox
2017-12-13 13:01 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 9:25 ` [PATCH 2/2] fs, elf: drop MAP_FIXED usage from elf_map Michal Hocko
2017-12-16 0:49 ` [2/2] " Andrei Vagin
2017-12-18 9:13 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-18 18:12 ` Andrei Vagin
2017-12-18 18:49 ` [PATCH] mm: don't use the same value for MAP_FIXED_SAFE and MAP_SYNC Andrei Vagin
2017-12-18 20:41 ` Michal Hocko
2018-04-18 10:51 ` [PATCH 2/2] fs, elf: drop MAP_FIXED usage from elf_map Tetsuo Handa
2018-04-18 11:33 ` Michal Hocko
2018-04-18 11:43 ` Tetsuo Handa
2018-04-18 11:55 ` Michal Hocko
2018-04-18 14:07 ` [PATCH v2] fs, elf: don't complain MAP_FIXED_NOREPLACE unless -EEXIST error Tetsuo Handa
2018-04-19 5:57 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 9:31 ` [PATCH 1/2] mmap.2: document new MAP_FIXED_SAFE flag Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 9:31 ` [PATCH 2/2] mmap.2: MAP_FIXED updated documentation Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 12:55 ` Pavel Machek
2017-12-13 13:03 ` Cyril Hrubis
2017-12-13 13:04 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 13:09 ` Pavel Machek
2017-12-13 13:16 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 13:21 ` Pavel Machek
2017-12-13 13:35 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 14:40 ` Cyril Hrubis
2017-12-13 23:19 ` Kees Cook
2017-12-14 7:07 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-18 19:12 ` Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
2017-12-18 20:19 ` Kees Cook
2017-12-18 20:33 ` Matthew Wilcox
2017-12-21 12:38 ` Michael Ellerman
2017-12-21 14:59 ` known bad patch in -mm tree was " Pavel Machek
2017-12-21 15:08 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-21 22:24 ` Andrew Morton
2017-12-22 0:06 ` Michael Ellerman
2017-12-14 2:52 ` Jann Horn
2017-12-14 5:28 ` John Hubbard
2017-12-14 23:06 ` John Hubbard [this message]
2017-12-14 23:10 ` Jann Horn
2017-12-13 12:25 ` [PATCH v2 0/2] mm: introduce MAP_FIXED_SAFE Matthew Wilcox
2017-12-13 12:34 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-13 17:13 ` Kees Cook
2017-12-15 9:02 ` Michael Ellerman
2017-12-14 0:32 ` Andrew Morton
2017-12-14 1:35 ` David Goldblatt
2017-12-14 1:42 ` David Goldblatt
2017-12-14 12:44 ` Edward Napierala
2017-12-14 13:15 ` Michal Hocko
2017-12-14 14:54 ` Edward Napierala
2017-12-19 12:40 ` David Laight
2017-12-19 12:46 ` Michal Hocko
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