Re: [PATCH] pstore: Remove duplicate invoking of persistent_ram_zap()

[Kees Cook]

On Fri, Oct 26, 2018 at 4:41 AM, Peng15 Wang çé <wangpeng15@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> From: Peng Wang <wangpeng15@xxxxxxxxxx>
>
> When initialing przs with invalid data in buffer(no PERSISTENT_RAM_SIG),
> function call path is like this:
>
> ramoops_init_prz ->
> |
> |-> persistent_ram_new -> persistent_ram_post_init -> persistent_ram_zap
> |
> |--> persistent_ram_zap

There does appear to be a duplicate call to persistent_ram_zap() in this case.

> As we can see, persistent_ram_zap() is called twice.
> We can avoid this by removing it in ramoops_init_prz(),
> and only call it in persistent_ram_post_init().

However, I think the proposed fix doesn't work the way it should.

There are two prz init paths: ramoops_init_prz() (a single prz) and
ramoops_init_przs (multiple przs). The "dump" and "ftrace" cases use
the latter. In those, there is no call to persistent_ram_zap() if the
buffer is valid.

In other words:

ramoops_init_prz() unconditionally calls persistent_ram_zap(). (And
may call it twice if there is a mismatch of the magic header.)

ramoops_init_przs() only calls persistent_ram_zap() when the magic
header is wrong.

The proposed patch unconditionally zaps all regions, which means we'd
lose "dump" and "ftrace" across the next reboot.

Perhaps we could make it an option to persistent_ram_new()?

-- 
Kees Cook