Re: [PATCH 1/1] set wo_stat to an init value in do_wait function

From: Oleg Nesterov
Date: Wed Nov 02 2011 - 10:55:27 EST


On 11/02, hank wrote:
>
> When all of the below conditions become true:
> 1 parent fork a child
> 2 parent ignore SIGCHLD signal
> 3 parent call waitpid function
> do_wait function won't touch the wo->stat variable.

Of course it doesn't, do_wait() fails and does nothing.

The parent ignores SIGCHLD. In this case waitpid(&status) acts as
if there are no children. Except it sleeps.

IOW,

> int main(int argc, char *argv[])
> {
> int pid, child;
> int status;
> int *p;
>
> signal(SIGCHLD, SIG_IGN);
>
> child = fork();
> if (child == 0) {
> sleep(1);
> exit(0);
> } else if (child < 0) {
> perror("fork");
> exit(1);
> } else {
> status = 0xa5a5;
> p = &status;
> printf("status addr: %p\n", p);
> pid = waitpid(-1, &status, WUNTRACED);
> printf("pid=%d status=0x%x\n", pid, status);
> exit(0);
> }
> return 0;
> }
> ========================================================
>
> After run this program, we can see the value of status is still
> 0xa5a5,so kernel do not touch this value.

Sure, this is correct.

> It may be dangerous. Because lots of programs such as 'su' don't set
> an init value for the variable 'status' when it call waitpid function,
> and after the waitpid function return, the program may check the value
> of 'status' to see the state of child.

Then this program is buggy. Once again, waitpid() fails. The program
shouldn't look at status at all.

Oleg.

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