netdev - Re: [RFC PATCH net-next 01/11] netns: Fix race between put_net() and netlink_kernel

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Message-ID: <87oalwcn5z.fsf@x220.int.ebiederm.org>
Date:	Thu, 07 May 2015 12:28:24 -0500
From:	ebiederm@...ssion.com (Eric W. Biederman)
To:	Cong Wang <cwang@...pensource.com>
Cc:	Herbert Xu <herbert@...dor.apana.org.au>,
	Ying Xue <ying.xue@...driver.com>,
	netdev <netdev@...r.kernel.org>, xemul@...nvz.org,
	David Miller <davem@...emloft.net>,
	Eric Dumazet <eric.dumazet@...il.com>, maxk@....qualcomm.com,
	Stephen Hemminger <stephen@...workplumber.org>,
	Thomas Graf <tgraf@...g.ch>,
	Nicolas Dichtel <nicolas.dichtel@...nd.com>,
	Tom Herbert <tom@...bertland.com>,
	James Chapman <jchapman@...alix.com>,
	Erik Hugne <erik.hugne@...csson.com>, jon.maloy@...csson.com,
	horms@...ge.net.au
Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH net-next 01/11] netns: Fix race between put_net() and netlink_kernel_create()

Cong Wang <cwang@...pensource.com> writes:

> On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 2:04 AM, Herbert Xu <herbert@...dor.apana.org.au> wrote:
>> On Thu, May 07, 2015 at 04:52:40PM +0800, Ying Xue wrote:
>>>
>>> @@ -409,12 +410,17 @@ void __put_net(struct net *net)
>>>  {
>>>       /* Cleanup the network namespace in process context */
>>>       unsigned long flags;
>>> +     bool added = false;
>>>
>>>       spin_lock_irqsave(&cleanup_list_lock, flags);
>>> -     list_add(&net->cleanup_list, &cleanup_list);
>>> +     if (list_empty(&net->cleanup_list)) {
>>> +             list_add(&net->cleanup_list, &cleanup_list);
>>> +             added = true;
>>> +     }
>>
>> Stop right there.  If a ref count is hitting zero twice you've
>> got big problems.  Because it means that after hitting zero the
>> first time it'll become positive again (if only briefly) which
>> opens you up to a race against the cleanup.
>
> That is true.
>
>>
>> So this idea is a non-starter.
>>
>> The rules for ref counts are really simple, if you hit zero then
>> you're dead.  Can someone explain to me in simple terms why this
>> ref count is special and needs to hit zero twice?
>
> Because after it hits zero, it queues the final cleanup to a workqueue,
> which could be delayed (depends on when the worker will be scheduled),
> therefore there is a small window that new ->init() could come in.
>
> You can argue that netns->init() should not see a dead netns, but
> unfortunately that seems even harder since removing netns from global
> netns list requires rtnl lock which is not doable in __put_net().

See my reply upthread where I have already written the code to ensure
netns->init() does not see a dead netns.  It is a very reasonable
expectation and not all that hard to ensure.

Eric



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