linux-kernel - [PATCH][next] pstore: ram_core: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member

lists.openwall.net		lists / announce owl-users owl-dev john-users john-dev passwdqc-users yescrypt popa3d-users / oss-security kernel-hardening musl sabotage tlsify passwords / crypt-dev xvendor / Bugtraq Full-Disclosure linux-kernel linux-netdev linux-ext4 linux-hardening linux-cve-announce PHC
Open Source and information security mailing list archives

Hash Suite: Windows password security audit tool. GUI, reports in PDF.

[<prev] [next>] [thread-next>] [day] [month] [year] [list]

Message-ID: <20200309202327.GA8813@embeddedor>
Date:   Mon, 9 Mar 2020 15:23:27 -0500
From:   "Gustavo A. R. Silva" <gustavo@...eddedor.com>
To:     Kees Cook <keescook@...omium.org>,
        Anton Vorontsov <anton@...msg.org>,
        Colin Cross <ccross@...roid.com>,
        Tony Luck <tony.luck@...el.com>
Cc:     linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
        "Gustavo A. R. Silva" <gustavo@...eddedor.com>
Subject: [PATCH][next] pstore: ram_core: Replace zero-length array with
 flexible-array member

The current codebase makes use of the zero-length array language
extension to the C90 standard, but the preferred mechanism to declare
variable-length types such as these ones is a flexible array member[1][2],
introduced in C99:

struct foo {
        int stuff;
        struct boo array[];
};

By making use of the mechanism above, we will get a compiler warning
in case the flexible array does not occur last in the structure, which
will help us prevent some kind of undefined behavior bugs from being
inadvertently introduced[3] to the codebase from now on.

Also, notice that, dynamic memory allocations won't be affected by
this change:

"Flexible array members have incomplete type, and so the sizeof operator
may not be applied. As a quirk of the original implementation of
zero-length arrays, sizeof evaluates to zero."[1]

This issue was found with the help of Coccinelle.

[1] https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc/Zero-Length.html
[2] https://github.com/KSPP/linux/issues/21
[3] commit 76497732932f ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")

Signed-off-by: Gustavo A. R. Silva <gustavo@...eddedor.com>
---
 fs/pstore/ram_core.c | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/fs/pstore/ram_core.c b/fs/pstore/ram_core.c
index 1f4d8c06f9be..c917c191e78c 100644
--- a/fs/pstore/ram_core.c
+++ b/fs/pstore/ram_core.c
@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ struct persistent_ram_buffer {
 	uint32_t    sig;
 	atomic_t    start;
 	atomic_t    size;
-	uint8_t     data[0];
+	uint8_t     data[];
 };
 
 #define PERSISTENT_RAM_SIG (0x43474244) /* DBGC */
-- 
2.25.0