linux-kernel - Re: livepatch: reuse module loader code to write relocations

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Date:	Thu, 10 Dec 2015 08:28:30 -0600
From:	Josh Poimboeuf <jpoimboe@...hat.com>
To:	Jessica Yu <jeyu@...hat.com>
Cc:	Rusty Russell <rusty@...tcorp.com.au>,
	Seth Jennings <sjenning@...hat.com>,
	Jiri Kosina <jikos@...nel.org>,
	Vojtech Pavlik <vojtech@...e.com>,
	Jonathan Corbet <corbet@....net>,
	Miroslav Benes <mbenes@...e.cz>, linux-api@...r.kernel.org,
	live-patching@...r.kernel.org, x86@...nel.org,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, linux-s390@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-doc@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: livepatch: reuse module loader code to write relocations

On Wed, Dec 09, 2015 at 02:10:14PM -0500, Jessica Yu wrote:
> +++ Josh Poimboeuf [08/12/15 12:38 -0600]:
> >>+	/* For each __klp_rela section for this object */
> >>+	klp_for_each_reloc_sec(obj, reloc_sec) {
> >>+		relindex = reloc_sec->index;
> >>+		num_relas = pmod->sechdrs[relindex].sh_size / sizeof(Elf_Rela);
> >>+		rela = (Elf_Rela *) pmod->sechdrs[relindex].sh_addr;
> >>+
> >>+		/* For each rela in this __klp_rela section */
> >>+		for (i = 0; i < num_relas; i++, rela++) {
> >>+			sym = symtab + ELF_R_SYM(rela->r_info);
> >>+			symname = pmod->core_strtab + sym->st_name;
> >>+
> >>+			if (sym->st_shndx == SHN_LIVEPATCH) {
> >>+				if (sym->st_info == 'K')
> >>+					ret = klp_find_external_symbol(pmod, symname, &addr);
> >>+				else
> >>+					ret = klp_find_object_symbol(obj->name, symname, &addr);
> >>+				if (ret)
> >>+					return ret;
> >>+				sym->st_value = addr;
> >
> >So I think you're also working on removing the 'external' stuff.  Any
> >idea how this code will handle that?  Specifically I'm wondering how the
> >objname and sympos of the rela's symbol will be specified.  Maybe it can
> >be encoded somehow in one of the symbol fields (st_value)?
> 
> Thanks for bringing this up. I think we can just encode the symbol's
> position in kallsyms in the symbol's st_other field. It isn't used
> anywhere and has size char, which is plenty of bits to represent the
> small ints.

st_other does seem to at least have some trivial usage in the kernel,
see print_absolute_symbols() and sym_visibility() in
arch/x86/tools/relocs.c.  Two of the bits are used to specify the
"visibility" of a symbol.  Also readelf shows a "Vis" column in the
symbol table.

> For objname, the simplest solution might be to append ".klp.objname"
> to the symbol name, and extract out this suffix when resolving the
> symbol. Another way might be to have st_value contain the index into
> the strtab (or .kpatch.strings) that contains the objname. Then we'd
> access the objname just like how we access the symbol's name (strtab +
> sym->st_name). After we find the objname we can then overwrite
> st_value with the real address. I think this second method is cleaner.
> Thoughts?

Yeah, I guess there are a lot of possibilities for ways to encode it.

Personally I think it would be nice if the encoding were something that
could easily be seen when dumping the symbol table with readelf.  So,
for example, the objname could be encoded in the symbol name (as you
suggested), and the sympos could be in st_value.

If we do that, it'd probably be good to keep the naming consistent with
the '__klp_rela_objname.symname' thing.  So something like
'_klp_sym_objname.symname'.

But... would there be any side effects associated with renaming it?  For
example, would it cause problems with the s390 PLT?

-- 
Josh
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