linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH v5 2/3] pid: Introduce pidfd

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Message-ID: <CAMp4zn-x3wiYVgmoVfkA61Epfh7JoEHUn5QCpULERxLPkLoMYA@mail.gmail.com>
Date:   Sun, 22 Dec 2019 10:36:42 -0800
From:   Sargun Dhillon <sargun@...gun.me>
To:     Christian Brauner <christian.brauner@...ntu.com>
Cc:     LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
        Linux Containers <containers@...ts.linux-foundation.org>,
        Linux API <linux-api@...r.kernel.org>,
        Linux FS-devel Mailing List <linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org>,
        Tycho Andersen <tycho@...ho.ws>, Jann Horn <jannh@...gle.com>,
        Aleksa Sarai <cyphar@...har.com>,
        Oleg Nesterov <oleg@...hat.com>,
        Andy Lutomirski <luto@...capital.net>,
        Al Viro <viro@...iv.linux.org.uk>,
        Gian-Carlo Pascutto <gpascutto@...illa.com>,
        Emilio Cobos Álvarez <ealvarez@...illa.com>,
        Florian Weimer <fweimer@...hat.com>,
        Jed Davis <jld@...illa.com>, Arnd Bergmann <arnd@...db.de>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v5 2/3] pid: Introduce pidfd_getfd syscall

, On Sun, Dec 22, 2019 at 4:48 AM Christian Brauner
<christian.brauner@...ntu.com> wrote:
>
> On Fri, Dec 20, 2019 at 11:28:13PM +0000, Sargun Dhillon wrote:
> > This syscall allows for the retrieval of file descriptors from other
> > processes, based on their pidfd. This is possible using ptrace, and
> > injection of parasitic code along with using SCM_RIGHTS to move
> > file descriptors between a tracee and a tracer. Unfortunately, ptrace
> > comes with a high cost of requiring the process to be stopped, and
> > breaks debuggers. This does not require stopping the process under
> > manipulation.
> >
> > One reason to use this is to allow sandboxers to take actions on file
> > descriptors on the behalf of another process. For example, this can be
> > combined with seccomp-bpf's user notification to do on-demand fd
> > extraction and take privileged actions. For example, it can be used
> > to bind a socket to a privileged port.
> >
> > /* prototype */
> >   /*
> >    * pidfd_getfd_options is an extensible struct which can have options
> >    * added to it. If options is NULL, size, and it will be ignored be
> >    * ignored, otherwise, size should be set to sizeof(*options). If
> >    * option is newer than the current kernel version, E2BIG will be
> >    * returned.
> >    */
> >   struct pidfd_getfd_options {};
> >   long pidfd_getfd(int pidfd, int fd, unsigned int flags,
> >                  struct pidfd_getfd_options *options, size_t size);
That's embarrassing. This was supposed to read:
long pidfd_getfd(int pidfd, int fd, struct pidfd_get_options *options,
size_t size);

>
> The prototype advertises a flags argument but the actual
>
> +SYSCALL_DEFINE4(pidfd_getfd, int, pidfd, int, fd,
> +               struct pidfd_getfd_options __user *, options, size_t, usize)
>
> does not have a flags argument...
>
> I think having a flags argument makes a lot of sense.
>
> I'm not sure what to think about the struct. I agree with Aleksa that
> having an empty struct is not a great idea. From a design perspective it
> seems very out of place. If we do a struct at all putting at least a
> single reserved field in there might makes more sense.
>
> In general, I think we need to have a _concrete_ reason why putting a
> struct versioned by size as arguments for this syscall.
> That means we need to have at least a concrete example for a new feature
> for this syscall where a flag would not convey enough information.
I can think of at least two reasons we need flags:
* Clearing cgroup flags
* Closing the process under manipulation's FD when we fetch it.

The original reason for wanting to have two places where we can put
flags was to have a different field for fd flags vs. call flags. I'm not sure
there's any flags you'd want to set.

Given this, if we want to go down the route of a syscall, we should just
leave it as a __u64 flags, and drop the pointer to the struct, if we're
not worried about that.

>
> And I'm not sure that there is a good one... I guess one thing I can
> think of is that a caller might want dup-like semantics, i.e. a caller
> might want to say:
>
> pidfd_getfd(<pidfd>, <fd-to-get>, <fd-number-to-want>, <flags>, ...)
>
> such that after pidfd_getfd() returns <fd-to-get> corresponds to
> <fd-number-to-want> in the caller. But that can also be achieved via:
> int fd = pidfd_getfd(<pidfd>, <fd-to-get>, <flags>, ...)
> int final_fd = dup3(fd, <newfd>, O_CLOEXEC)
>
> >
> > /* testing */
> > Ran self-test suite on x86_64
>
> +1
>