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Message-ID: <CAObL_7HZHcJFKsisGpWSMG+29+wiVsTuYKe-bu0Sd-j_7uQ3Vw@mail.gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 24 Apr 2014 15:43:47 -0700
From: Andrew Lutomirski <amluto@...il.com>
To: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...or.com>
Cc: "H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...ux.intel.com>, comex <comexk@...il.com>,
Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
Ingo Molnar <mingo@...nel.org>,
Alexander van Heukelum <heukelum@...tmail.fm>,
Konrad Rzeszutek Wilk <konrad.wilk@...cle.com>,
Boris Ostrovsky <boris.ostrovsky@...cle.com>,
Borislav Petkov <bp@...en8.de>,
Arjan van de Ven <arjan.van.de.ven@...el.com>,
Brian Gerst <brgerst@...il.com>,
Alexandre Julliard <julliard@...ehq.com>,
Andi Kleen <andi@...stfloor.org>,
Thomas Gleixner <tglx@...utronix.de>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] x86-64: espfix for 64-bit mode *PROTOTYPE*
On Thu, Apr 24, 2014 at 3:37 PM, H. Peter Anvin <hpa@...or.com> wrote:
> On 04/24/2014 03:31 PM, Andrew Lutomirski wrote:
>>
>> I was imagining just randomizing a couple of high bits so the whole
>> espfix area moves as a unit.
>>
>>> We could XOR with a random constant with no penalty at all. Only
>>> problem is that this happens early, so the entropy system is not yet
>>> available. Fine if we have RDRAND, but...
>>
>> How many people have SMAP and not RDRAND? I think this is a complete
>> nonissue for non-SMAP systems.
>>
>
> Most likely none, unless some "clever" virtualizer turns off RDRAND out
> of spite.
>
>>>> Peter, is this idea completely nuts? The only exceptions that can
>>>> happen there are NMI, MCE, #DB, #SS, and #GP. The first four use IST,
>>>> so they won't double-fault.
>>>
>>> It is completely nuts, but sometimes completely nuts is actually useful.
>>> It is more complexity, to be sure, but it doesn't seem completely out
>>> of the realm of reason, and avoids having to unwind the ministack except
>>> in the normally-fatal #DF handler. #DFs are documented as not
>>> recoverable, but we might be able to do something here.
>>>
>>> The only real disadvantage I see is the need for more bookkeeping
>>> metadata. Basically the bitmask in espfix_64.c now needs to turn into
>>> an array, plus we need a second percpu variable. Given that if
>>> CONFIG_NR_CPUS=8192 the array has 128 entries I think we can survive that.
>>
>> Doing something in #DF needs percpu data? What am I missing?
>
> You need the second percpu variable in the espfix setup code so you have
> both the write address and the target rsp (read address).
>
Duh. :)
--Andy
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