linux-kernel - Re: Race condition between userland and USB device attachment

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Date:	Mon, 28 Jul 2014 11:31:21 +0200
From:	Oliver Neukum <oneukum@...e.de>
To:	Sergey Klyaus <Sergey.Klyaus@...e-IT.Ru>
Cc:	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	Alan Stern <stern@...land.harvard.edu>
Subject: Re: Race condition between userland and USB device attachment

On Fri, 2014-07-25 at 17:43 +0400, Sergey Klyaus wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> I am currently working on a project with Thin clients with Citrix 
> Receiver 13 for Linux and encountered interesting problem with USB 
> device redirection.
> ctxusb/ctxusbd process from Citrix Receiver are using inotify mechanism 
> to monitor /dev/bus/usb filesystem, and when device arrives, tries to 
> open it, but get ENODEV status:
> Jul 25 11:36:13 myaut-desktop ctxusbd[2664]: Failed to open device: No 
> such device
> Jul 25 11:36:13 myaut-desktop ctxusb[2751]: Failed to open device 
> 001:003 (error 19 - No such device), bad id?
> 
> It is caused by design of device_add() function: it calls 
> devtmpfs_create_node before bus_add_device. Here are sequence of events:
> 1. device_add() calls devtmpfs_create_node(). That leads to inotify 
> event that.
> 2. ctxusb is awoken because inotify event arises, and calls ctxusbd daemon.
> 3. ctxusbd daemon opens /dev/bus/usb/new-device, so usbdev_open() 
> routine is called
> 4. usbdev_open() calls  usbdev_lookup_by_devt(). Because device is not 
> yet attached to "usb bus", it returns NULL, and thus usbdev_open() 
> returns -ENODEV
> 5. Finally, device_add() calls bus_add_device(), and all subsequent 
> calls of usbdev_open() will succeed. However, ctxusb/ctxusbd already 
> reported an error and abandon device. User is unsatisfied.
> 
> I was able to reproduce that issue on Ubuntu 10.04 with 2.6.32 and 3.13 
> kernels.
> However, it only occur on uni-processor systems (!)
> 
> I see three ways to solve that issue:
> 1. Leave it to userland applications (i.e. using loop with retries and 
> timeouts). However, I feel that it is a kernel issue (application is 
> notified before device is ready).
> 2. Call bus_add_device() before devtmpfs_create_node(). Very rough, and 
> probably breaks a lot of other kernel code.
> 3. Wait in usbdev_open() until reconfiguration is finished (i.e. by 
> using some global lock between usb_new_device() and usbdev_open(), or 
> add completion and special state USB_STATE_CONNECTING to a device).

No to your third option. This is no USB problem. The issue is in the
generic code. The only clean fix is your suggestion (2)

	Regards
		Oliver


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