<feed xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom'>
<title>user/sven/linux.git/include/linux/livepatch.h, branch v5.5.14</title>
<subtitle>Linux Kernel
</subtitle>
<id>https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/atom?h=v5.5.14</id>
<link rel='self' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/atom?h=v5.5.14'/>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/'/>
<updated>2019-11-01T12:08:19Z</updated>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Allow to distinguish different version of system state changes</title>
<updated>2019-11-01T12:08:19Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Petr Mladek</name>
<email>pmladek@suse.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-10-30T15:43:11Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=92c9abf5e57500ea7dc59a55273aa7850b631bda'/>
<id>urn:sha1:92c9abf5e57500ea7dc59a55273aa7850b631bda</id>
<content type='text'>
The atomic replace runs pre/post (un)install callbacks only from the new
livepatch. There are several reasons for this:

  + Simplicity: clear ordering of operations, no interactions between
	old and new callbacks.

  + Reliability: only new livepatch knows what changes can already be made
	by older livepatches and how to take over the state.

  + Testing: the atomic replace can be properly tested only when a newer
	livepatch is available. It might be too late to fix unwanted effect
	of callbacks from older	livepatches.

It might happen that an older change is not enough and the same system
state has to be modified another way. Different changes need to get
distinguished by a version number added to struct klp_state.

The version can also be used to prevent loading incompatible livepatches.
The check is done when the livepatch is enabled. The rules are:

  + Any completely new system state modification is allowed.

  + System state modifications with the same or higher version are allowed
    for already modified system states.

  + Cumulative livepatches must handle all system state modifications from
    already installed livepatches.

  + Non-cumulative livepatches are allowed to touch already modified
    system states.

Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20191030154313.13263-4-pmladek@suse.com
To: Jiri Kosina &lt;jikos@kernel.org&gt;
Cc: Kamalesh Babulal &lt;kamalesh@linux.vnet.ibm.com&gt;
Cc: Nicolai Stange &lt;nstange@suse.de&gt;
Cc: live-patching@vger.kernel.org
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Acked-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Joe Lawrence &lt;joe.lawrence@redhat.com&gt;
Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Basic API to track system state changes</title>
<updated>2019-11-01T12:08:14Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Petr Mladek</name>
<email>pmladek@suse.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-10-30T15:43:10Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=73727f4dafa2df107e85753c5ab703a1f344e1f1'/>
<id>urn:sha1:73727f4dafa2df107e85753c5ab703a1f344e1f1</id>
<content type='text'>
This is another step how to help maintaining more livepatches.

One big help was the atomic replace and cumulative livepatches. These
livepatches replace the already installed ones. Therefore it should
be enough when each cumulative livepatch is consistent.

The problems might come with shadow variables and callbacks. They might
change the system behavior or state so that it is no longer safe to
go back and use an older livepatch or the original kernel code. Also,
a new livepatch must be able to detect changes which were made by
the already installed livepatches.

This is where the livepatch system state tracking gets useful. It
allows to:

  - find whether a system state has already been modified by
    previous livepatches

  - store data needed to manipulate and restore the system state

The information about the manipulated system states is stored in an
array of struct klp_state. It can be searched by two new functions
klp_get_state() and klp_get_prev_state().

The dependencies are going to be solved by a version field added later.
The only important information is that it will be allowed to modify
the same state by more non-cumulative livepatches. It is similar
to allowing to modify the same function several times. The livepatch
author is responsible for preventing incompatible changes.

Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20191030154313.13263-3-pmladek@suse.com
To: Jiri Kosina &lt;jikos@kernel.org&gt;
Cc: Kamalesh Babulal &lt;kamalesh@linux.vnet.ibm.com&gt;
Cc: Nicolai Stange &lt;nstange@suse.de&gt;
Cc: live-patching@vger.kernel.org
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Acked-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Joe Lawrence &lt;joe.lawrence@redhat.com&gt;
Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>Merge branch 'for-linus' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/livepatching/livepatching</title>
<updated>2019-07-11T22:30:05Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Linus Torvalds</name>
<email>torvalds@linux-foundation.org</email>
</author>
<published>2019-07-11T22:30:05Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=db0457338ece7482378d88e50ad298191c3e6947'/>
<id>urn:sha1:db0457338ece7482378d88e50ad298191c3e6947</id>
<content type='text'>
Pull livepatching updates from Jiri Kosina:

 - stacktrace handling improvements from Miroslav benes

 - debug output improvements from Petr Mladek

* 'for-linus' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/livepatching/livepatching:
  livepatch: Remove duplicate warning about missing reliable stacktrace support
  Revert "livepatch: Remove reliable stacktrace check in klp_try_switch_task()"
  stacktrace: Remove weak version of save_stack_trace_tsk_reliable()
  livepatch: Use static buffer for debugging messages under rq lock
  livepatch: Remove stale kobj_added entries from kernel-doc descriptions
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>treewide: Replace GPLv2 boilerplate/reference with SPDX - rule 13</title>
<updated>2019-05-21T09:28:45Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Thomas Gleixner</name>
<email>tglx@linutronix.de</email>
</author>
<published>2019-05-19T13:51:43Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=1ccea77e2a2687cae171b7987eb44730ec8c6d5f'/>
<id>urn:sha1:1ccea77e2a2687cae171b7987eb44730ec8c6d5f</id>
<content type='text'>
Based on 2 normalized pattern(s):

  this program is free software you can redistribute it and or modify
  it under the terms of the gnu general public license as published by
  the free software foundation either version 2 of the license or at
  your option any later version this program is distributed in the
  hope that it will be useful but without any warranty without even
  the implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular
  purpose see the gnu general public license for more details you
  should have received a copy of the gnu general public license along
  with this program if not see http www gnu org licenses

  this program is free software you can redistribute it and or modify
  it under the terms of the gnu general public license as published by
  the free software foundation either version 2 of the license or at
  your option any later version this program is distributed in the
  hope that it will be useful but without any warranty without even
  the implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular
  purpose see the gnu general public license for more details [based]
  [from] [clk] [highbank] [c] you should have received a copy of the
  gnu general public license along with this program if not see http
  www gnu org licenses

extracted by the scancode license scanner the SPDX license identifier

  GPL-2.0-or-later

has been chosen to replace the boilerplate/reference in 355 file(s).

Signed-off-by: Thomas Gleixner &lt;tglx@linutronix.de&gt;
Reviewed-by: Kate Stewart &lt;kstewart@linuxfoundation.org&gt;
Reviewed-by: Jilayne Lovejoy &lt;opensource@jilayne.com&gt;
Reviewed-by: Steve Winslow &lt;swinslow@gmail.com&gt;
Reviewed-by: Allison Randal &lt;allison@lohutok.net&gt;
Cc: linux-spdx@vger.kernel.org
Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20190519154041.837383322@linutronix.de
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman &lt;gregkh@linuxfoundation.org&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Remove stale kobj_added entries from kernel-doc descriptions</title>
<updated>2019-05-09T15:21:06Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Miroslav Benes</name>
<email>mbenes@suse.cz</email>
</author>
<published>2019-05-07T13:08:14Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=aec71d794731c441a9b7ee9705efedd2f6054173'/>
<id>urn:sha1:aec71d794731c441a9b7ee9705efedd2f6054173</id>
<content type='text'>
Commit 4d141ab3416d ("livepatch: Remove custom kobject state handling")
removed kobj_added members of klp_func, klp_object and klp_patch
structures. kernel-doc descriptions were omitted by accident. Remove
them.

Reported-by: Kamalesh Babulal &lt;kamalesh@linux.vnet.ibm.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Joe Lawrence &lt;joe.lawrence@redhat.com&gt;
Reviewed-by: Kamalesh Babulal &lt;kamalesh@linux.vnet.ibm.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Jiri Kosina &lt;jkosina@suse.cz&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Remove custom kobject state handling</title>
<updated>2019-05-03T19:11:22Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Petr Mladek</name>
<email>pmladek@suse.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-05-03T13:26:24Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=4d141ab3416d90f87775f5dee725efdf40110a8f'/>
<id>urn:sha1:4d141ab3416d90f87775f5dee725efdf40110a8f</id>
<content type='text'>
kobject_init() always succeeds and sets the reference count to 1.
It allows to always free the structures via kobject_put() and
the related release callback.

Note that the custom kobject state handling was used only
because we did not know that kobject_put() can and actually
should get called even when kobject_init_and_add() fails.

The patch should not change the existing behavior.

Suggested-by: "Tobin C. Harding" &lt;tobin@kernel.org&gt;
Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
Reviewed-by: Kamalesh Babulal &lt;kamalesh@linux.vnet.ibm.com&gt;
Acked-by: Joe Lawrence &lt;joe.lawrence@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Jiri Kosina &lt;jkosina@suse.cz&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Add atomic replace</title>
<updated>2019-01-11T19:51:24Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Jason Baron</name>
<email>jbaron@akamai.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-01-09T12:43:25Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=e1452b607c48c642caf57299f4da83aa002f8533'/>
<id>urn:sha1:e1452b607c48c642caf57299f4da83aa002f8533</id>
<content type='text'>
Sometimes we would like to revert a particular fix. Currently, this
is not easy because we want to keep all other fixes active and we
could revert only the last applied patch.

One solution would be to apply new patch that implemented all
the reverted functions like in the original code. It would work
as expected but there will be unnecessary redirections. In addition,
it would also require knowing which functions need to be reverted at
build time.

Another problem is when there are many patches that touch the same
functions. There might be dependencies between patches that are
not enforced on the kernel side. Also it might be pretty hard to
actually prepare the patch and ensure compatibility with the other
patches.

Atomic replace &amp;&amp; cumulative patches:

A better solution would be to create cumulative patch and say that
it replaces all older ones.

This patch adds a new "replace" flag to struct klp_patch. When it is
enabled, a set of 'nop' klp_func will be dynamically created for all
functions that are already being patched but that will no longer be
modified by the new patch. They are used as a new target during
the patch transition.

The idea is to handle Nops' structures like the static ones. When
the dynamic structures are allocated, we initialize all values that
are normally statically defined.

The only exception is "new_func" in struct klp_func. It has to point
to the original function and the address is known only when the object
(module) is loaded. Note that we really need to set it. The address is
used, for example, in klp_check_stack_func().

Nevertheless we still need to distinguish the dynamically allocated
structures in some operations. For this, we add "nop" flag into
struct klp_func and "dynamic" flag into struct klp_object. They
need special handling in the following situations:

  + The structures are added into the lists of objects and functions
    immediately. In fact, the lists were created for this purpose.

  + The address of the original function is known only when the patched
    object (module) is loaded. Therefore it is copied later in
    klp_init_object_loaded().

  + The ftrace handler must not set PC to func-&gt;new_func. It would cause
    infinite loop because the address points back to the beginning of
    the original function.

  + The various free() functions must free the structure itself.

Note that other ways to detect the dynamic structures are not considered
safe. For example, even the statically defined struct klp_object might
include empty funcs array. It might be there just to run some callbacks.

Also note that the safe iterator must be used in the free() functions.
Otherwise already freed structures might get accessed.

Special callbacks handling:

The callbacks from the replaced patches are _not_ called by intention.
It would be pretty hard to define a reasonable semantic and implement it.

It might even be counter-productive. The new patch is cumulative. It is
supposed to include most of the changes from older patches. In most cases,
it will not want to call pre_unpatch() post_unpatch() callbacks from
the replaced patches. It would disable/break things for no good reasons.
Also it should be easier to handle various scenarios in a single script
in the new patch than think about interactions caused by running many
scripts from older patches. Not to say that the old scripts even would
not expect to be called in this situation.

Removing replaced patches:

One nice effect of the cumulative patches is that the code from the
older patches is no longer used. Therefore the replaced patches can
be removed. It has several advantages:

  + Nops' structs will no longer be necessary and might be removed.
    This would save memory, restore performance (no ftrace handler),
    allow clear view on what is really patched.

  + Disabling the patch will cause using the original code everywhere.
    Therefore the livepatch callbacks could handle only one scenario.
    Note that the complication is already complex enough when the patch
    gets enabled. It is currently solved by calling callbacks only from
    the new cumulative patch.

  + The state is clean in both the sysfs interface and lsmod. The modules
    with the replaced livepatches might even get removed from the system.

Some people actually expected this behavior from the beginning. After all
a cumulative patch is supposed to "completely" replace an existing one.
It is like when a new version of an application replaces an older one.

This patch does the first step. It removes the replaced patches from
the list of patches. It is safe. The consistency model ensures that
they are no longer used. By other words, each process works only with
the structures from klp_transition_patch.

The removal is done by a special function. It combines actions done by
__disable_patch() and klp_complete_transition(). But it is a fast
track without all the transaction-related stuff.

Signed-off-by: Jason Baron &lt;jbaron@akamai.com&gt;
[pmladek@suse.com: Split, reuse existing code, simplified]
Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
Cc: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Cc: Jessica Yu &lt;jeyu@kernel.org&gt;
Cc: Jiri Kosina &lt;jikos@kernel.org&gt;
Cc: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Jiri Kosina &lt;jkosina@suse.cz&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Use lists to manage patches, objects and functions</title>
<updated>2019-01-11T19:51:24Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Jason Baron</name>
<email>jbaron@akamai.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-01-09T12:43:24Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=20e55025958e18e671d92c7adea00c301ac93c43'/>
<id>urn:sha1:20e55025958e18e671d92c7adea00c301ac93c43</id>
<content type='text'>
Currently klp_patch contains a pointer to a statically allocated array of
struct klp_object and struct klp_objects contains a pointer to a statically
allocated array of klp_func. In order to allow for the dynamic allocation
of objects and functions, link klp_patch, klp_object, and klp_func together
via linked lists. This allows us to more easily allocate new objects and
functions, while having the iterator be a simple linked list walk.

The static structures are added to the lists early. It allows to add
the dynamically allocated objects before klp_init_object() and
klp_init_func() calls. Therefore it reduces the further changes
to the code.

This patch does not change the existing behavior.

Signed-off-by: Jason Baron &lt;jbaron@akamai.com&gt;
[pmladek@suse.com: Initialize lists before init calls]
Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
Acked-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Joe Lawrence &lt;joe.lawrence@redhat.com&gt;
Cc: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Cc: Jiri Kosina &lt;jikos@kernel.org&gt;
Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Jiri Kosina &lt;jkosina@suse.cz&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Simplify API by removing registration step</title>
<updated>2019-01-11T19:51:24Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Petr Mladek</name>
<email>pmladek@suse.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-01-09T12:43:23Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=958ef1e39d24d6cb8bf2a7406130a98c9564230f'/>
<id>urn:sha1:958ef1e39d24d6cb8bf2a7406130a98c9564230f</id>
<content type='text'>
The possibility to re-enable a registered patch was useful for immediate
patches where the livepatch module had to stay until the system reboot.
The improved consistency model allows to achieve the same result by
unloading and loading the livepatch module again.

Also we are going to add a feature called atomic replace. It will allow
to create a patch that would replace all already registered patches.
The aim is to handle dependent patches more securely. It will obsolete
the stack of patches that helped to handle the dependencies so far.
Then it might be unclear when a cumulative patch re-enabling is safe.

It would be complicated to support the many modes. Instead we could
actually make the API and code easier to understand.

Therefore, remove the two step public API. All the checks and init calls
are moved from klp_register_patch() to klp_enabled_patch(). Also the patch
is automatically freed, including the sysfs interface when the transition
to the disabled state is completed.

As a result, there is never a disabled patch on the top of the stack.
Therefore we do not need to check the stack in __klp_enable_patch().
And we could simplify the check in __klp_disable_patch().

Also the API and logic is much easier. It is enough to call
klp_enable_patch() in module_init() call. The patch can be disabled
by writing '0' into /sys/kernel/livepatch/&lt;patch&gt;/enabled. Then the module
can be removed once the transition finishes and sysfs interface is freed.

The only problem is how to free the structures and kobjects safely.
The operation is triggered from the sysfs interface. We could not put
the related kobject from there because it would cause lock inversion
between klp_mutex and kernfs locks, see kn-&gt;count lockdep map.

Therefore, offload the free task to a workqueue. It is perfectly fine:

  + The patch can no longer be used in the livepatch operations.

  + The module could not be removed until the free operation finishes
    and module_put() is called.

  + The operation is asynchronous already when the first
    klp_try_complete_transition() fails and another call
    is queued with a delay.

Suggested-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
Acked-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Jiri Kosina &lt;jkosina@suse.cz&gt;
</content>
</entry>
<entry>
<title>livepatch: Don't block the removal of patches loaded after a forced transition</title>
<updated>2019-01-11T19:51:24Z</updated>
<author>
<name>Petr Mladek</name>
<email>pmladek@suse.com</email>
</author>
<published>2019-01-09T12:43:22Z</published>
<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='https://git.stealer.net/cgit.cgi/user/sven/linux.git/commit/?id=68007289bf3cd937a5b8fc4987d2787167bd06ca'/>
<id>urn:sha1:68007289bf3cd937a5b8fc4987d2787167bd06ca</id>
<content type='text'>
module_put() is currently never called in klp_complete_transition() when
klp_force is set. As a result, we might keep the reference count even when
klp_enable_patch() fails and klp_cancel_transition() is called.

This might give the impression that a module might get blocked in some
strange init state. Fortunately, it is not the case. The reference count
is ignored when mod-&gt;init fails and erroneous modules are always removed.

Anyway, this might be confusing. Instead, this patch moves
the global klp_forced flag into struct klp_patch. As a result,
we block only modules that might still be in use after a forced
transition. Newly loaded livepatches might be eventually completely
removed later.

It is not a big deal. But the code is at least consistent with
the reality.

Signed-off-by: Petr Mladek &lt;pmladek@suse.com&gt;
Acked-by: Joe Lawrence &lt;joe.lawrence@redhat.com&gt;
Acked-by: Miroslav Benes &lt;mbenes@suse.cz&gt;
Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf &lt;jpoimboe@redhat.com&gt;
Signed-off-by: Jiri Kosina &lt;jkosina@suse.cz&gt;
</content>
</entry>
</feed>
