[PATCH 1/3] drm/nouveau: Fix NULL pointer dereferences in GETPARAM ioctl

From: Jim Cromie via B4 Relay

Date: Fri Oct 02 2026 - 14:09:48 EST


From: Jim Cromie <jim.cromie@xxxxxxxxx>

When hardware or firmware initialization fails, the graphics engine
(gr) or device functions may remain NULL. Attempting to access these
during the GETPARAM ioctl (e.g., NOUVEAU_GETPARAM_GRAPH_UNITS) results
in a kernel NULL pointer dereference, causing a crash when userspace
(GNOME/Mesa) attempts to probe the device.

Add safety checks for 'gr', 'gr->func', and 'nvkm_device->func' in the
ioctl handler. Return -ENODEV to signal the missing hardware state to
userspace, and use NV_ERROR_ONCE to provide diagnostic proof in the
kernel log without risking a console flood.

NOTE:

I encountered these crashes while booting unrelated code (in
dynamic-debug) on real HW. There was also some fwupd updates around
this time, so it could all be transient/unreproducible. But it did
happen, and could happen again in unforseen circumstances.

Signed-off-by: Jim Cromie <jim.cromie@xxxxxxxxx>
---
drivers/gpu/drm/nouveau/nouveau_abi16.c | 25 +++++++++++++++++++++----
1 file changed, 21 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/drivers/gpu/drm/nouveau/nouveau_abi16.c b/drivers/gpu/drm/nouveau/nouveau_abi16.c
index 4542d5f4ded8..cb1810dee8e5 100644
--- a/drivers/gpu/drm/nouveau/nouveau_abi16.c
+++ b/drivers/gpu/drm/nouveau/nouveau_abi16.c
@@ -306,7 +306,12 @@ nouveau_abi16_ioctl_getparam(ABI16_IOCTL_ARGS)
getparam->value = 1;
break;
case NOUVEAU_GETPARAM_GRAPH_UNITS:
- getparam->value = nvkm_gr_units(gr);
+ if (gr && gr->func) {
+ getparam->value = nvkm_gr_units(gr);
+ } else {
+ NV_ERROR_ONCE(drm, "GETPARAM_GRAPH_UNITS: no gr engine or func\n");
+ return -ENODEV;
+ }
break;
case NOUVEAU_GETPARAM_EXEC_PUSH_MAX: {
int ib_max = getparam_dma_ib_max(device);
@@ -315,11 +320,23 @@ nouveau_abi16_ioctl_getparam(ABI16_IOCTL_ARGS)
break;
}
case NOUVEAU_GETPARAM_VRAM_BAR_SIZE:
- getparam->value = nvkm_device->func->resource_size(nvkm_device, NVKM_BAR1_FB);
+ if (nvkm_device && nvkm_device->func && nvkm_device->func->resource_size) {
+ getparam->value =
+ nvkm_device->func->resource_size(nvkm_device, NVKM_BAR1_FB);
+ } else {
+ NV_ERROR_ONCE(drm, "GETPARAM_VRAM_BAR_SIZE: no device func\n");
+ return -ENODEV;
+ }
break;
case NOUVEAU_GETPARAM_VRAM_USED: {
- struct ttm_resource_manager *vram_mgr = ttm_manager_type(&drm->ttm.bdev, TTM_PL_VRAM);
- getparam->value = (u64)ttm_resource_manager_usage(vram_mgr);
+ struct ttm_resource_manager *vram_mgr =
+ ttm_manager_type(&drm->ttm.bdev, TTM_PL_VRAM);
+ if (vram_mgr) {
+ getparam->value = (u64)ttm_resource_manager_usage(vram_mgr);
+ } else {
+ NV_ERROR_ONCE(drm, "GETPARAM_VRAM_USED: no vram mgr\n");
+ return -ENODEV;
+ }
break;
}
case NOUVEAU_GETPARAM_HAS_VMA_TILEMODE:

--
2.55.0