linux-kernel - [PATCH 4.7 111/141] kernel/fork: fix CLONE_CHILD

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Date:   Thu,  6 Oct 2016 10:29:07 +0200
From:   Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@...uxfoundation.org>
To:     linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Cc:     Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@...uxfoundation.org>,
        stable@...r.kernel.org, Michal Hocko <mhocko@...e.com>,
        William Preston <wpreston@...e.com>,
        Oleg Nesterov <oleg@...hat.com>,
        Roland McGrath <roland@...k.frob.com>,
        Andreas Schwab <schwab@...e.com>,
        Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
        Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>
Subject: [PATCH 4.7 111/141] kernel/fork: fix CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID regression in nscd

4.7-stable review patch.  If anyone has any objections, please let me know.

------------------

From: Michal Hocko <mhocko@...e.com>

commit 735f2770a770156100f534646158cb58cb8b2939 upstream.

Commit fec1d0115240 ("[PATCH] Disable CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID for abnormal
exit") has caused a subtle regression in nscd which uses
CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID to clear the nscd_certainly_running flag in the
shared databases, so that the clients are notified when nscd is
restarted.  Now, when nscd uses a non-persistent database, clients that
have it mapped keep thinking the database is being updated by nscd, when
in fact nscd has created a new (anonymous) one (for non-persistent
databases it uses an unlinked file as backend).

The original proposal for the CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID change claimed
(https://lkml.org/lkml/2006/10/25/233):

: The NPTL library uses the CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID flag on clone() syscalls
: on behalf of pthread_create() library calls.  This feature is used to
: request that the kernel clear the thread-id in user space (at an address
: provided in the syscall) when the thread disassociates itself from the
: address space, which is done in mm_release().
:
: Unfortunately, when a multi-threaded process incurs a core dump (such as
: from a SIGSEGV), the core-dumping thread sends SIGKILL signals to all of
: the other threads, which then proceed to clear their user-space tids
: before synchronizing in exit_mm() with the start of core dumping.  This
: misrepresents the state of process's address space at the time of the
: SIGSEGV and makes it more difficult for someone to debug NPTL and glibc
: problems (misleading him/her to conclude that the threads had gone away
: before the fault).
:
: The fix below is to simply avoid the CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID action if a
: core dump has been initiated.

The resulting patch from Roland (https://lkml.org/lkml/2006/10/26/269)
seems to have a larger scope than the original patch asked for.  It
seems that limitting the scope of the check to core dumping should work
for SIGSEGV issue describe above.

[Changelog partly based on Andreas' description]
Fixes: fec1d0115240 ("[PATCH] Disable CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID for abnormal exit")
Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/1471968749-26173-1-git-send-email-mhocko@kernel.org
Signed-off-by: Michal Hocko <mhocko@...e.com>
Tested-by: William Preston <wpreston@...e.com>
Acked-by: Oleg Nesterov <oleg@...hat.com>
Cc: Roland McGrath <roland@...k.frob.com>
Cc: Andreas Schwab <schwab@...e.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@...uxfoundation.org>

---
 kernel/fork.c |   10 ++++------
 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+), 6 deletions(-)

--- a/kernel/fork.c
+++ b/kernel/fork.c
@@ -938,14 +938,12 @@ void mm_release(struct task_struct *tsk,
 	deactivate_mm(tsk, mm);

 	/*
-	 * If we're exiting normally, clear a user-space tid field if
-	 * requested.  We leave this alone when dying by signal, to leave
-	 * the value intact in a core dump, and to save the unnecessary
-	 * trouble, say, a killed vfork parent shouldn't touch this mm.
-	 * Userland only wants this done for a sys_exit.
+	 * Signal userspace if we're not exiting with a core dump
+	 * because we want to leave the value intact for debugging
+	 * purposes.
 	 */
 	if (tsk->clear_child_tid) {
-		if (!(tsk->flags & PF_SIGNALED) &&
+		if (!(tsk->signal->flags & SIGNAL_GROUP_COREDUMP) &&
 		    atomic_read(&mm->mm_users) > 1) {
 			/*
 			 * We don't check the error code - if userspace has