linux-kernel - Re: [syzbot] [hfs?] WARNING in hfs_write

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 for Android: free password hash cracker in your pocket

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

Message-ID: <CAH8yC8=BwacXyFQret5pKVCzXXO0jLM_u9eW3bTdyPi4y8CSfw@mail.gmail.com>
Date:   Thu, 20 Jul 2023 17:38:52 -0400
From:   Jeffrey Walton <noloader@...il.com>
To:     Matthew Wilcox <willy@...radead.org>
Cc:     John Paul Adrian Glaubitz <glaubitz@...sik.fu-berlin.de>,
        Dmitry Vyukov <dvyukov@...gle.com>,
        Viacheslav Dubeyko <slava@...eyko.com>,
        Arnd Bergmann <arnd@...db.de>,
        Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
        syzbot <syzbot+7bb7cd3595533513a9e7@...kaller.appspotmail.com>,
        Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
        christian.brauner@...ntu.com,
        Damien Le Moal <damien.lemoal@...nsource.wdc.com>,
        Jeff Layton <jlayton@...nel.org>,
        Linux FS Devel <linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org>,
        LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
        syzkaller-bugs@...glegroups.com,
        ZhangPeng <zhangpeng362@...wei.com>,
        linux-m68k@...ts.linux-m68k.org,
        debian-ports <debian-ports@...ts.debian.org>
Subject: Re: [syzbot] [hfs?] WARNING in hfs_write_inode

On Thu, Jul 20, 2023 at 2:39 PM Matthew Wilcox <willy@...radead.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Jul 20, 2023 at 07:50:47PM +0200, John Paul Adrian Glaubitz wrote:
> > > Then we should delete the HFS/HFS+ filesystems.  They're orphaned in
> > > MAINTAINERS and if distros are going to do such a damnfool thing,
> > > then we must stop them.
> >
> > Both HFS and HFS+ work perfectly fine. And if distributions or users are so
> > sensitive about security, it's up to them to blacklist individual features
> > in the kernel.
> >
> > Both HFS and HFS+ have been the default filesystem on MacOS for 30 years
> > and I don't think it's justified to introduce such a hard compatibility
> > breakage just because some people are worried about theoretical evil
> > maid attacks.
> >
> > HFS/HFS+ mandatory if you want to boot Linux on a classic Mac or PowerMac
> > and I don't think it's okay to break all these systems running Linux.
>
> If they're so popular, then it should be no trouble to find somebody
> to volunteer to maintain those filesystems.  Except they've been
> marked as orphaned since 2011 and effectively were orphaned several
> years before that (the last contribution I see from Roman Zippel is
> in 2008, and his last contribution to hfs was in 2006).

One data point may help.. I've been running Linux on an old PowerMac
and an old Intel MacBook since about 2014 or 2015 or so. I have needed
the HFS/HFS+ filesystem support for about 9 years now (including that
"blessed" support for the Apple Boot partition).

There's never been a problem with Linux and the Apple filesystems.
Maybe it speaks to the maturity/stability of the code that already
exists. The code does not need a lot of attention nowadays.

Maybe the orphaned status is the wrong metric to use to determine
removal. Maybe a better metric would be installation base. I.e., how
many users use the filesystem.

Jeff