netdev - Re: [PATCH v2] rcu: fix a race in hlist_nulls_for_each_entry

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Date:	Tue, 28 May 2013 13:10:46 +0400
From:	Roman Gushchin <klamm@...dex-team.ru>
To:	Eric Dumazet <eric.dumazet@...il.com>
CC:	paulmck@...ux.vnet.ibm.com, Dipankar Sarma <dipankar@...ibm.com>,
	zhmurov@...dex-team.ru, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	netdev@...r.kernel.org, "David S. Miller" <davem@...emloft.net>,
	Alexey Kuznetsov <kuznet@....inr.ac.ru>,
	James Morris <jmorris@...ei.org>,
	Hideaki YOSHIFUJI <yoshfuji@...ux-ipv6.org>,
	Patrick McHardy <kaber@...sh.net>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2] rcu: fix a race in hlist_nulls_for_each_entry_rcu
 macro

On 28.05.2013 04:12, Eric Dumazet wrote:
> On Mon, 2013-05-27 at 21:55 +0400, Roman Gushchin wrote:
>> Hi, Paul!
>>
>>> On 25.05.2013 15:37, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
>>>> Again, I believe that your retry logic needs to extend back into the
>>>> calling function for your some_func() example above.
>>
>> And what do you think about the following approach (diff below)?
>>
>> It seems to me, it's enough clear (especially with good accompanying comments)
>> and produces a good binary code (without significant overhead).
>> Also, we will remove a hidden reef in using rcu-protected (h)list traverses with restarts.
>>
>
>> diff --git a/include/linux/rculist_nulls.h b/include/linux/rculist_nulls.h
>> index 2ae1371..4af5ee5 100644
>> --- a/include/linux/rculist_nulls.h
>> +++ b/include/linux/rculist_nulls.h
>> @@ -107,7 +107,8 @@ static inline void hlist_nulls_add_head_rcu(struct hlist_nulls_node *n,
>>     *
>>     */
>>    #define hlist_nulls_for_each_entry_rcu(tpos, pos, head, member)                        \
>> -       for (pos = rcu_dereference_raw(hlist_nulls_first_rcu(head));            \
>> +       for (ACCESS_ONCE(*(head)),                                              \
>> +               pos = rcu_dereference_raw(hlist_nulls_first_rcu(head));         \
>>                   (!is_a_nulls(pos)) &&                                           \
>>                   ({ tpos = hlist_nulls_entry(pos, typeof(*tpos), member); 1; }); \
>>                   pos = rcu_dereference_raw(hlist_nulls_next_rcu(pos)))
>
> It looks like this still relies on gcc being friendly here.
>
> I repeat again : @head here is a constant.

No.
Actually, there are two volatile objects: pointer to the first element (as a part of the head structure),
and the first element by itself. So, to be strict, head as a structure contains a volatile field.
Head->first should be treated as a volatile pointer to a volatile data. So, the whole head object is volatile.

>
> Macro already uses ACCESS_ONCE(), we only have to instruct gcc that
> caching the value is forbidden if we restart the loop
> (aka "goto begin;" see Documentation/RCU/rculist_nulls.txt line 146)

My patch seems to be correct, because, ACCESS_ONCE(*(head)) will cause gcc to (re)read head data from the memory.
According to gcc documentation:
	"A scalar volatile object is read when it is accessed in a void context:
      		volatile int *src = somevalue;
      		*src;
	Such expressions are rvalues, and GCC implements this as a read of the volatile object being pointed to."
And this is exactly our case.

> Adding a barrier() is probably what we want.

I agree, inserting barrier() is also a correct and working fix.

Thanks!

Regards,
Roman
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