Re: [PATCH V6 05/10] audit: log creation and deletion of namespace instances

From: Paul Moore <pmoore@redhat.com>
To: Oren Laadan <orenl@cellrox.com>
Cc: Richard Guy Briggs <rgb@redhat.com>,
	Steve Grubb <sgrubb@redhat.com>,
	linux-api@vger.kernel.org,
	Linux Containers <containers@lists.linux-foundation.org>,
	linux-kernel <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
	viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk, linux-audit@redhat.com,
	netdev@vger.kernel.org, linux-fsdevel@vger.kernel.org,
	eparis@parisplace.org, zohar@linux.vnet.ibm.com,
	Eric Biederman <ebiederm@xmission.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH V6 05/10] audit: log creation and deletion of namespace instances
Date: Fri, 15 May 2015 16:42:38 -0400	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <2697338.ReFgH43Z0x@sifl> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAA4jN2bgynVTwF+owtXgq06JMLQJpy_qokpD0mAguNYeDxmh1A@mail.gmail.com>

On Thursday, May 14, 2015 09:10:56 PM Oren Laadan wrote:
> [focusing on "containers id" - snipped the rest away]
> 
> I am unfamiliar with the audit subsystem, but work with namespaces in other
> contexts. Perhaps the term "container" is overloaded here. The definition
> suggested by Steve in this thread makes sense to me: "a combination of
> namespaces". I imagine people may want to audit subsets of namespaces.
> 
> For namespaces, can use a string like "A:B:C:D:E:F" as an identifier for a
> particular combination, where A-F are respective namespaces identifiers.
> (Can be taken for example from /proc/PID/ns/{mnt,uts,ipc,user,pid,net}).
>  That will even be grep-able to locate records related to a particular
> subset
> of namespaces. So a "container" in the classic meaning would have all A-F
> unique and different from the init process, but processes separated only by
> e.g. mnt-ns and net-ns will differ from the init process in  A and F.
> 
> (If a string is a no go, then perhaps combine the IDs in a unique way into a
> super ID).

As has been mentioned in every other email in this thread, the kernel has no 
concept of a container, it is a userspace idea and trying to generate a 
meaningful value in the kernel is a mistake in my opinion.  My current opinion 
is that we allow userspace to set a container ID token as it sees fit and the 
kernel will just use the value provided by userspace.

-- 
paul moore
security @ redhat