RE: [PATCH 0/1] Slightly relax the type checking done by min() and max().

[David Laight]

From: 'Andy Shevchenko'
> Sent: 25 November 2022 15:58
> 
> On Fri, Nov 25, 2022 at 03:27:07PM +0000, David Laight wrote:
> > From: Andy Shevchenko
> > > Sent: 25 November 2022 15:21
> > > On Fri, Nov 25, 2022 at 03:00:40PM +0000, David Laight wrote:
> > > > The min() and max() defines include a type check to avoid the unexpected
> > > >   behaviour when a negative value is compared against and unsigned value.
> > > > However a lot of code hits this check and uses min_t() to avoid the error.
> > > > Many of these are just plain wrong.
> > > >
> > > > Those casting to u8 or u16 are particularly suspect, eg:
> > > > drivers/usb/misc/usb251xb.c:528:
> > > > 		hub->max_current_sp = min_t(u8, property_u32 / 2000, 50);
> > >
> > > I don't buy this. What's exactly wrong with this code?
> >
> > Consider what happens if propery_u32 is 512000.
> > The returned value is 0 not 50.
> 
> I considered that and there are two things to consider on your side:
> 1) it's coming from device property;
> 2) device property is validated using YAML schema.
> 
> On top of that, the wrong property is on the user. We have a lot of stuff that
> user may put wrongly, but it's user's choice.
> 
> Any better example, please?

How about:

data_size = min_t(u16, buf_size, len);

https://elixir.bootlin.com/linux/v6.1-rc6/source/kernel/printk/printk_ringbuffer.c#L1738


Now, maybe, you could claim that buf_size > 64k never happens.
But the correct cast here is u32 to match buf_size.
len (being u16) will be promoted to int before the compare.

Just search the kernel for "min_t(u8," or "min_t(u16," while some might
be ok, I really wouldn't want to verify each case.

If you look hard enough there are also some:
	u32_var = min_t(u32, u32_val, u64_val);
where the intent is to limit values that might be invalid for u32.

I did try compiling a kernel with min_t() defined to be min() (no casts)
but there were too many false positives without allowing all
unsigned v unsigned compares.

	David

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