Re: [PATCH v2] fs/buffer: add alert in try_to_free_buffers() for folios without buffers
From: Jan Kara
Date: Thu Dec 11 2025 - 08:27:29 EST
On Thu 11-12-25 18:42:11, Deepakkumar Karn wrote:
> try_to_free_buffers() can be called on folios with no buffers attached
> when filemap_release_folio() is invoked on a folio belonging to a mapping
> with AS_RELEASE_ALWAYS set but no release_folio operation defined.
>
> In such cases, folio_needs_release() returns true because of the
> AS_RELEASE_ALWAYS flag, but the folio has no private buffer data. This
> causes try_to_free_buffers() to call drop_buffers() on a folio with no
> buffers, leading to a null pointer dereference.
>
> Adding a check in try_to_free_buffers() to return early if the folio has no
> buffers attached, with WARN_ON_ONCE() to alert about the misconfiguration.
> This provides defensive hardening.
>
> Signed-off-by: Deepakkumar Karn <dkarn@xxxxxxxxxx>
Looks good to me now. Feel free to add:
Reviewed-by: Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx>
Honza
> ---
> fs/buffer.c | 4 ++++
> 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+)
>
> diff --git a/fs/buffer.c b/fs/buffer.c
> index 838c0c571022..28e4d53f1717 100644
> --- a/fs/buffer.c
> +++ b/fs/buffer.c
> @@ -2948,6 +2948,10 @@ bool try_to_free_buffers(struct folio *folio)
> if (folio_test_writeback(folio))
> return false;
>
> + /* Misconfigured folio check */
> + if (WARN_ON_ONCE(!folio_buffers(folio)))
> + return true;
> +
> if (mapping == NULL) { /* can this still happen? */
> ret = drop_buffers(folio, &buffers_to_free);
> goto out;
> --
> 2.52.0
>
--
Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxxx>
SUSE Labs, CR