Re: [PATCH v2 0/6] x86: Clean up fast syscall return validation

[Ingo Molnar]

* Brian Gerst <brgerst@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> On Fri, Oct 6, 2023 at 2:59 PM H. Peter Anvin <hpa@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> > On 10/5/23 13:20, Ingo Molnar wrote:
> > >
> > > * Brian Gerst <brgerst@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > >
> > >> Looking at the compiled output, the only suboptimal code appears to be
> > >> the canonical address test, where the C code uses the CL register for
> > >> the shifts instead of immediates.
> > >>
> > >>   180:   e9 00 00 00 00          jmp    185 <do_syscall_64+0x85>
> > >>                          181: R_X86_64_PC32      .altinstr_aux-0x4
> > >>   185:   b9 07 00 00 00          mov    $0x7,%ecx
> > >>   18a:   eb 05                   jmp    191 <do_syscall_64+0x91>
> > >>   18c:   b9 10 00 00 00          mov    $0x10,%ecx
> > >>   191:   48 89 c2                mov    %rax,%rdx
> > >>   194:   48 d3 e2                shl    %cl,%rdx
> > >>   197:   48 d3 fa                sar    %cl,%rdx
> > >>   19a:   48 39 d0                cmp    %rdx,%rax
> > >>   19d:   75 39                   jne    1d8 <do_syscall_64+0xd8>
> > >
> > > Yeah, it didn't look equivalent - so I guess we want a C equivalent for:
> > >
> > > -       ALTERNATIVE "shl $(64 - 48), %rcx; sar $(64 - 48), %rcx", \
> > > -               "shl $(64 - 57), %rcx; sar $(64 - 57), %rcx", X86_FEATURE_LA57
> > >
> > > instead of the pgtable_l5_enabled() runtime test that
> > > __is_canonical_address() uses?
> > >
> >
> > I don't think such a thing (without simply duplicate the above as an
> > alternative asm, which is obviously easy enough, and still allows the
> > compiler to pick the register used) would be possible without immediate
> > patching support[*].
> >
> > Incidentally, this is a question for Uros: is there a reason this is a
> > mov to %ecx and not just %cl, which would save 3 bytes?
> >
> > Incidentally, it is possible to save one instruction and use only *one*
> > alternative immediate:
> >
> >         leaq (%rax,%rax),%rdx
> >         xorq %rax,%rdx
> >         shrq $(63 - LA),%rdx            # Yes, 63, not 64
> >         # ZF=1 if canonical
> >
> > This works because if bit [x] is set in the output, then bit [x] and
> > [x-1] in the input are different (bit [-1] considered to be zero); and
> > by definition a bit is canonical if and only if all the bits [63:LA] are
> > identical, thus bits [63:LA+1] in the output must all be zero.
> >
> > The first two instructions are pure arithmetic and can thus be done in C:
> >
> >         bar = foo ^ (foo << 1);
> >
> > ... leaving only one instruction needing to be patched at runtime.
> >
> >         -hpa
> 
> One other alternative I have been considering is comparing against
> TASK_SIZE_MAX.  The only user-executable address above that is the
> long deprecated vsyscall page.  IMHO it's not worth optimizing for
> that case, so just let it fall back to using IRET.
> 
>     if (unlikely(regs->ip >= TASK_SIZE_MAX)) return false;
> 
> compiles to:
> 
>  180:   48 b9 00 f0 ff ff ff    movabs $0x7ffffffff000,%rcx
>  187:   7f 00 00
>  18a:   48 39 c8                cmp    %rcx,%rax
>  18d:   73 39                   jae    1c8 <do_syscall_64+0xc8>
> 
> 0000000000000000 <.altinstr_replacement>:
>    0:   48 b9 00 f0 ff ff ff    movabs $0xfffffffffff000,%rcx
>    7:   ff ff 00

That sounds good - and we could do this as a separate patch on top
of your existing  patches, to keep it bisectable in case there's
any problems.

Thanks,

	Ingo