Re: [PATCH net-next] modules: allow modprobe load regular elf binaries

[Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>]

On Mon, Mar 5, 2018 at 5:34 PM, Alexei Starovoitov <ast@kernel.org> wrote:
> As the first step in development of bpfilter project [1] the request_module()
> code is extended to allow user mode helpers to be invoked. Idea is that
> user mode helpers are built as part of the kernel build and installed as
> traditional kernel modules with .ko file extension into distro specified
> location, such that from a distribution point of view, they are no different
> than regular kernel modules. Thus, allow request_module() logic to load such
> user mode helper (umh) modules via:
[,,]

I like this, but I have one request: can we make sure that this action
is visible in the system messages?

When we load a regular module, at least it shows in lsmod afterwards,
although I have a few times wanted to really see module load as an
event in the logs too.

When we load a module that just executes a user program, and there is
no sign of it in the module list, I think we *really* need to make
that event show to the admin some way.

.. and yes, maybe we'll need to rate-limit the messages, and maybe it
turns out that I'm entirely wrong and people will hate the messages
after they get used to the concept of these pseudo-modules, but
particularly for the early implementation when this is a new thing, I
really want a message like

     executed user process xyz-abc as a pseudo-module

or something in dmesg.

I do *not* want this to be a magical way to hide things.

                  Linus