[PATCH 1/2] printk: use logbuf_mutex_lock to stop syslog_seq from going wild

From: Yuanhan Liu
Date: Sat Jun 16 2012 - 00:41:34 EST


Although syslog_seq and log_next_seq stuff are protected by logbuf_lock
spin log, it's not enough. Say we have two processes A and B, and let
syslog_seq = N, while log_next_seq = N + 1, and the two processes both
come to syslog_print at almost the same time. And No matter which
process get the spin lock first, it will increase syslog_seq by one,
then release spin lock; thus later, another process increase syslog_seq
by one again. In this case, syslog_seq is bigger than syslog_next_seq.
And latter, it would make:
wait_event_interruptiable(log_wait, syslog != log_next_seq)
don't wait any more even there is no new write comes. Thus it introduce
a infinite loop reading.

I can easily see this kind of issue by the following steps:
# cat /proc/kmsg # at meantime, I don't kill rsyslog
# So they are the two processes.
# xinit # I added drm.debug=6 in the kernel parameter line,
# so that it will produce lots of message and let that
# issue happen

It's 100% reproducable on my side. And my disk will be filled up by
/var/log/messages in a quite short time.

So, introduce a mutex_lock to stop syslog_seq from going wild just like
what devkmsg_read() does. It does fix this issue as expected.

Cc: Kay Sievers <kay@xxxxxxxx>
Cc: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Signed-off-by: Yuanhan Liu <yuanhan.liu@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
---
kernel/printk.c | 7 ++++++-
1 files changed, 6 insertions(+), 1 deletions(-)

diff --git a/kernel/printk.c b/kernel/printk.c
index 32462d2..d2ddb83 100644
--- a/kernel/printk.c
+++ b/kernel/printk.c
@@ -206,6 +206,7 @@ struct log {
* used in interesting ways to provide interlocking in console_unlock();
*/
static DEFINE_RAW_SPINLOCK(logbuf_lock);
+static DEFINE_MUTEX(logbuf_mutex_lock);

/* the next printk record to read by syslog(READ) or /proc/kmsg */
static u64 syslog_seq;
@@ -1000,11 +1001,15 @@ int do_syslog(int type, char __user *buf, int len, bool from_file)
error = -EFAULT;
goto out;
}
+ mutex_lock(&logbuf_mutex_lock);
error = wait_event_interruptible(log_wait,
syslog_seq != log_next_seq);
- if (error)
+ if (error) {
+ mutex_unlock(&logbuf_mutex_lock);
goto out;
+ }
error = syslog_print(buf, len);
+ mutex_unlock(&logbuf_mutex_lock);
break;
/* Read/clear last kernel messages */
case SYSLOG_ACTION_READ_CLEAR:
--
1.7.3.1

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