Thread (2 messages) 2 messages, 2 authors, 2021-06-29

Re: [PATCH 2/4] arch/x86: implement the process_vm_exec syscall

From: Andrei Vagin <hidden>
Date: 2021-06-29 01:05:30
Also in: linux-api, lkml

On Mon, Jun 28, 2021 at 01:18:07PM -0500, Eric W. Biederman wrote:
Jann Horn [off-list ref] writes:
quoted
On Mon, Jun 28, 2021 at 6:30 PM Andy Lutomirski [off-list ref] wrote:
quoted
On Mon, Jun 28, 2021, at 9:13 AM, Jann Horn wrote:
quoted
On Wed, Apr 14, 2021 at 7:59 AM Andrei Vagin [off-list ref] wrote:
quoted
This change introduces the new system call:
process_vm_exec(pid_t pid, struct sigcontext *uctx, unsigned long flags,
                siginfo_t * uinfo, sigset_t *sigmask, size_t sizemask)

process_vm_exec allows to execute the current process in an address
space of another process.
[...]

I still think that this whole API is fundamentally the wrong approach
because it tries to shoehorn multiple usecases with different
requirements into a single API. But that aside:
quoted
+static void swap_mm(struct mm_struct *prev_mm, struct mm_struct *target_mm)
+{
+       struct task_struct *tsk = current;
+       struct mm_struct *active_mm;
+
+       task_lock(tsk);
+       /* Hold off tlb flush IPIs while switching mm's */
+       local_irq_disable();
+
+       sync_mm_rss(prev_mm);
+
+       vmacache_flush(tsk);
+
+       active_mm = tsk->active_mm;
+       if (active_mm != target_mm) {
+               mmgrab(target_mm);
+               tsk->active_mm = target_mm;
+       }
+       tsk->mm = target_mm;
I'm pretty sure you're not currently allowed to overwrite the ->mm
pointer of a userspace thread. For example, zap_threads() assumes that
all threads running under a process have the same ->mm. (And if you're
fiddling with ->mm stuff, you should probably CC linux-mm@.)
exec_mmap() does it, so it can’t be entirely impossible.
Yeah, true, execve can do it - I guess the thing that makes that
special is that it's running after de_thread(), so it's guaranteed to
be single-threaded?
Even the implementation detail of swapping the mm aside.  Even the idea
of swaping the mm is completely broken, as an endless system calls
depend upon the state held in task_struct.  io_uring just tried running
system calls of a process in a different context and we ultimately had
to make the threads part of the original process to make enough things
work to keep the problem tractable.

System calls deeply and fundamentally depend on task_struct and
signal_struct.
In opposite to io_uring, process_vm_exec doesn't intend to run system
calls in the context of the target process. We initially declare that
system calls are executed in the context of the current process with
just another mm. If we are talking about user-mode kernels, they will
need just two system calls: mmap and munmap. In case of CRIU, vmsplice
will be used too.
I can think of two possibilities.
1) Hijack and existing process thread.
2) Inject a new thread into an existing process.
I am not sure that I understand what you mean here, but it sounds like
we will need to do a context switch to execute anything in a context
of a hijacked thread. If I am right, it kills the main idea of
process_vm_exec. If I misunderstand your idea, maybe you can describe it
with more details.

Thanks,
Andrei

_______________________________________________
linux-um mailing list
linux-um@lists.infradead.org
http://lists.infradead.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-um
Keyboard shortcuts
hback out one level
jnext message in thread
kprevious message in thread
ldrill in
Escclose help / fold thread tree
?toggle this help