f0907827a8
This adds wrappers for the __builtin overflow checkers present in gcc
5.1+ as well as fallback implementations for earlier compilers. It's not
that easy to implement the fully generic __builtin_X_overflow(T1 a, T2
b, T3 *d) in macros, so the fallback code assumes that T1, T2 and T3 are
the same. We obviously don't want the wrappers to have different
semantics depending on $GCC_VERSION, so we also insist on that even when
using the builtins.
There are a few problems with the 'a+b < a' idiom for checking for
overflow: For signed types, it relies on undefined behaviour and is
not actually complete (it doesn't check underflow;
e.g. INT_MIN+INT_MIN == 0 isn't caught). Due to type promotion it
is wrong for all types (signed and unsigned) narrower than
int. Similarly, when a and b does not have the same type, there are
subtle cases like
u32 a;
if (a + sizeof(foo) < a)
return -EOVERFLOW;
a += sizeof(foo);
where the test is always false on 64 bit platforms. Add to that that it
is not always possible to determine the types involved at a glance.
The new overflow.h is somewhat bulky, but that's mostly a result of
trying to be type-generic, complete (e.g. catching not only overflow
but also signed underflow) and not relying on undefined behaviour.
Linus is of course right [1] that for unsigned subtraction a-b, the
right way to check for overflow (underflow) is "b > a" and not
"__builtin_sub_overflow(a, b, &d)", but that's just one out of six cases
covered here, and included mostly for completeness.
So is it worth it? I think it is, if nothing else for the documentation
value of seeing
if (check_add_overflow(a, b, &d))
return -EGOAWAY;
do_stuff_with(d);
instead of the open-coded (and possibly wrong and/or incomplete and/or
UBsan-tickling)
if (a+b < a)
return -EGOAWAY;
do_stuff_with(a+b);
While gcc does recognize the 'a+b < a' idiom for testing unsigned add
overflow, it doesn't do nearly as good for unsigned multiplication
(there's also no single well-established idiom). So using
check_mul_overflow in kcalloc and friends may also make gcc generate
slightly better code.
[1] https://lkml.org/lkml/2015/11/2/658
Signed-off-by: Rasmus Villemoes <linux@rasmusvillemoes.dk>
Signed-off-by: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>
Linux kernel
============
There are several guides for kernel developers and users. These guides can
be rendered in a number of formats, like HTML and PDF. Please read
Documentation/admin-guide/README.rst first.
In order to build the documentation, use ``make htmldocs`` or
``make pdfdocs``. The formatted documentation can also be read online at:
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/
There are various text files in the Documentation/ subdirectory,
several of them using the Restructured Text markup notation.
See Documentation/00-INDEX for a list of what is contained in each file.
Please read the Documentation/process/changes.rst file, as it contains the
requirements for building and running the kernel, and information about
the problems which may result by upgrading your kernel.