On Sun, Mar 15, 2015 at 12:59 AM, Josh Triplett <josh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> This patch series introduces a new clone flag, CLONE_FD, which lets the caller
> receive child process exit notification via a file descriptor rather than
> SIGCHLD. CLONE_FD makes it possible for libraries to safely launch and manage
> child processes on behalf of their caller, *without* taking over process-wide
> SIGCHLD handling (either via signal handler or signalfd).
>
> Note that signalfd for SIGCHLD does not suffice here, because that still
> receives notification for all child processes, and interferes with process-wide
> signal handling.
>
> The CLONE_FD file descriptor uniquely identifies a process on the system in a
> race-free way, by holding a reference to the task_struct. In the future, we
> may introduce APIs that support using process file descriptors instead of PIDs.
>
> This patch series also introduces a clone flag CLONE_AUTOREAP, which causes the
> kernel to automatically reap the child process when it exits, just as it does
> for processes using SIGCHLD when the parent has SIGCHLD ignored or marked as
> SA_NOCLDSTOP.
>
> Taken together, a library can launch a process with CLONE_FD, CLONE_AUTOREAP,
> and no exit signal, and completely avoid affecting either process-wide signal
> handling or an existing child wait loop.
>
> Introducing CLONE_FD and CLONE_AUTOREAP required two additional bits of yak
> shaving: Since clone has no more usable flags (with the three currently unused
> flags unusable because old kernels ignore them without EINVAL), also introduce
> a new clone4 system call with more flag bits and an extensible argument
> structure. And since the magic pt_regs-based syscall argument processing for
> clone's tls argument would otherwise prevent introducing a sane clone4 system
> call, fix that too.
>
> I tested the CLONE_SETTLS changes with a thread-local storage test program (two
> threads independently reading and writing a __thread variable), on both 32-bit
> and 64-bit, and I observed no issues there.
>
> I tested clone4 and the new flags with several additional test programs,
> launching either a process or thread (in the former case using syscall(), in
> the latter case by calling clone4 via assembly and returning to C), sleeping in
> parent and child to test the case of either exiting first, and then printing
> the received clone4_info structure.
>
> Changes in v2:
> - Split out autoreaping into a separate CLONE_AUTOREAP. CLONE_FD no longer
> implies autoreaping and no exit signal, and CLONE_AUTOREAP does not affect
> ptracers or signal handling. Thanks to Oleg Nesterov for careful
> investigation and discussion on v1.
> - Accept O_CLOEXEC and O_NONBLOCK via a clonefd_flags parameter in clone4_args.
> Stop overloading the low byte of the main clone flags, since CLONE_FD now
> works with a non-zero signal.
> - Return the file descriptor via an out parameter in clone4_args.
> - Drop patch to export alloc_fd; CLONE_FD now uses the next available file
> descriptor, even if that's 0-2, since clone4 no longer needs to avoid
> ambiguity with the 0 return indicating the child process.
> - Make poll on a CLONE_FD for an exited task also return POLLHUP, for
> compatibility with FreeBSD's pdfork. Thanks to David Drysdale for calling
> attention to pdfork.
I think POLLHUP should be mentioned in the manpage (now it only
mentions POLLIN).
> - Fix typo in squelch_clone_flags.
> - Pass arguments to _do_fork and copy_process as a structure.
> - Construct the 64-bit flags in a separate variable, rather than inline in the
> call to do_fork.
> - Fix error return for copy_from_user faults.
> - Add the new syscall to asm-generic.
> - Add ack from Andy Lutomirski to patches 1 and 2.
>
> I've included the manpages patch at the end of this series. (Note that the
> manpage documents the behavior of the future glibc wrapper as well as the raw
> syscall.) Here's a formatted plain-text version of the manpage for reference:
>
> CLONE4(2) Linux Programmer's Manual CLONE4(2)
>
>
>
> NAME
> clone4 - create a child process
>
> SYNOPSIS
> /* Prototype for the glibc wrapper function */
>
> #define _GNU_SOURCE
> #include <sched.h>
>
> int clone4(uint64_t flags,
> size_t args_size,
> struct clone4_args *args,
> int (*fn)(void *), void *arg);
>
> /* Prototype for the raw system call */
>
> int clone4(unsigned flags_high, unsigned flags_low,
> unsigned long args_size,
> struct clone4_args *args);
>
> struct clone4_args {
> pid_t *ptid;
> pid_t *ctid;
> unsigned long stack_start;
> unsigned long stack_size;
> unsigned long tls;
> int *clonefd;
> unsigned clonefd_flags;
> };
>
>
> DESCRIPTION
> clone4() creates a new process, similar to clone(2) and fork(2).
> clone4() supports additional flags that clone(2) does not, and accepts
> arguments via an extensible structure.
>
> args points to a clone4_args structure, and args_size must contain the
> size of that structure, as understood by the caller. If the caller
> passes a shorter structure than the kernel expects, the remaining
> fields will default to 0. If the caller passes a larger structure than
> the kernel expects (such as one from a newer kernel), clone4() will
> return EINVAL. The clone4_args structure may gain additional fields at
> the end in the future, and callers must only pass a size that encom‐
> passes the number of fields they understand. If the caller passes 0
> for args_size, args is ignored and may be NULL.
>
> In the clone4_args structure, ptid, ctid, stack_start, stack_size, and
> tls have the same semantics as they do with clone(2) and clone2(2).
>
> In the glibc wrapper, fn and arg have the same semantics as they do
> with clone(2). As with clone(2), the underlying system call works more
> like fork(2), returning 0 in the child process; the glibc wrapper sim‐
> plifies thread execution by calling fn(arg) and exiting the child when
> that function exits.
>
> The 64-bit flags argument (split into the 32-bit flags_high and
> flags_low arguments in the kernel interface for portability across
> architectures) accepts all the same flags as clone(2), with the excep‐
> tion of the obsolete CLONE_PID, CLONE_DETACHED, and CLONE_STOPPED. In
> addition, flags accepts the following flags:
>
>
> CLONE_AUTOREAP
> When the new process exits, immediately reap it, rather than
> keeping it around as a "zombie" until a call to waitpid(2) or
> similar. Without this flag, the kernel will automatically reap
> a process if its exit signal is set to SIGCHLD, and if the par‐
> ent process has SIGCHLD set to SIG_IGN or has a SIGCHLD handler
> installed with SA_NOCLDWAIT (see sigaction(2)). CLONE_AUTOREAP
> allows the calling process to enable automatic reaping with an
> exit signal other than SIGCHLD (including 0 to disable the exit
> signal), and does not depend on the configuration of process-
> wide signal handling.
>
>
> CLONE_FD
> Return a file descriptor associated with the new process, stor‐
> ing it in location clonefd in the parent's address space. When
> the new process exits, the file descriptor will become available
> for reading.
>
> Unlike using signalfd(2) for the SIGCHLD signal, the file
> descriptor returned by clone4() with the CLONE_FD flag works
> even with SIGCHLD unblocked in one or more threads of the parent
> process, allowing the process to have different handlers for
> different child processes, such as those created by a library,
> without introducing race conditions around process-wide signal
> handling.
>
> clonefd_flags may contain the following additional flags for use
> with CLONE_FD:
>
>
> O_CLOEXEC
> Set the close-on-exec flag on the new file descriptor.
> See the description of the O_CLOEXEC flag in open(2) for
> reasons why this may be useful.
This begs the question: what happens when all CLONE_FD fds for a
process are closed? Will the parent get SIGCHLD instead, will it
auto-reap, or will it be un-wait-able (I assume not this...)
>
>
> O_NONBLOCK
> Set the O_NONBLOCK flag on the new file descriptor.
> Using this flag saves extra calls to fcntl(2) to achieve
> the same result.
>
>
> The returned file descriptor supports the following operations:
>
> read(2) (and similar)
> When the new process exits, reading from the file
> descriptor produces a single clonefd_info structure:
>
> struct clonefd_info {
> uint32_t code; /* Signal code */
> uint32_t status; /* Exit status or signal */
> uint64_t utime; /* User CPU time */
> uint64_t stime; /* System CPU time */
> };
>
>
> If the new process has not yet exited, read(2) either
> blocks until it does, or fails with the error EAGAIN if
> the file descriptor has O_NONBLOCK set.
>
> Future kernels may extend clonefd_info by appending addi‐
> tional fields to the end. Callers should read as many
> bytes as they understand; unread data will be discarded,
> and subsequent reads after the first will return 0 to
> indicate end-of-file. Callers requesting more bytes than
> the kernel provides (such as callers expecting a newer
> clonefd_info structure) will receive a shorter structure
> from older kernels.
>
> poll(2), select(2), epoll(7) (and similar)
> The file descriptor is readable (the select(2) readfds
> argument; the poll(2) POLLIN flag) if the new process has
> exited.
>
> close(2)
> When the file descriptor is no longer required it should
> be closed.
>
>
> C library/kernel ABI differences
> As with clone(2), the raw clone4() system call corresponds more closely
> to fork(2) in that execution in the child continues from the point of
> the call.
>
> Unlike clone(2), the raw system call interface for clone4() accepts
> arguments in the same order on all architectures.
>
> The raw system call accepts flags as two 32-bit arguments, flags_high
> and flags_low, to simplify portability across 32-bit and 64-bit archi‐
> tectures and calling conventions. The glibc wrapper accepts flags as a
> single 64-bit argument for convenience.
>
>
> RETURN VALUE
> For the glibc wrapper, on success, clone4() returns the new process ID
> to the calling process, and the new process begins running at the spec‐
> ified function.
>
> For the raw syscall, on success, clone4() returns the new process ID to
> the calling process, and returns 0 in the new process.
>
> On failure, clone4() returns -1 and sets errno accordingly.
>
>
> ERRORS
> clone4() can return any error from clone(2), as well as the following
> additional errors:
>
> EFAULT args is outside your accessible address space.
>
> EINVAL flags contained an unknown flag.
>
> EINVAL flags included CLONE_FD and clonefd_flags contained an unknown
> flag.
>
> EINVAL flags included CLONE_FD, but the kernel configuration does not
> have the CONFIG_CLONEFD option enabled.
>
> EMFILE flags included CLONE_FD, but the new file descriptor would
> exceed the process limit on open file descriptors.
>
> ENFILE flags included CLONE_FD, but the new file descriptor would
> exceed the system-wide limit on open file descriptors.
>
> ENODEV flags included CLONE_FD, but clone4() could not mount the
> (internal) anonymous inode device.
>
>
> CONFORMING TO
> clone4() is Linux-specific and should not be used in programs intended
> to be portable.
>
>
> SEE ALSO
> clone(2), epoll(7), poll(2), pthreads(7), read(2), select(2)
>
>
>
> Linux 2015-03-14 CLONE4(2)
>
>
> Josh Triplett and Thiago Macieira (7):
> clone: Support passing tls argument via C rather than pt_regs magic
> x86: Opt into HAVE_COPY_THREAD_TLS, for both 32-bit and 64-bit
> Introduce a new clone4 syscall with more flag bits and extensible arguments
> kernel/fork.c: Pass arguments to _do_fork and copy_process using clone4_args
> clone4: Add a CLONE_AUTOREAP flag to automatically reap the child process
> signal: Factor out a helper function to process task_struct exit_code
> clone4: Add a CLONE_FD flag to get task exit notification via fd
>
> arch/Kconfig | 7 ++
> arch/x86/Kconfig | 1 +
> arch/x86/ia32/ia32entry.S | 3 +-
> arch/x86/kernel/entry_64.S | 1 +
> arch/x86/kernel/process_32.c | 6 +-
> arch/x86/kernel/process_64.c | 8 +--
> arch/x86/syscalls/syscall_32.tbl | 1 +
> arch/x86/syscalls/syscall_64.tbl | 2 +
> include/linux/compat.h | 14 ++++
> include/linux/sched.h | 22 ++++++
> include/linux/syscalls.h | 6 +-
> include/uapi/asm-generic/unistd.h | 4 +-
> include/uapi/linux/sched.h | 55 ++++++++++++++-
> init/Kconfig | 21 ++++++
> kernel/Makefile | 1 +
> kernel/clonefd.c | 121 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> kernel/clonefd.h | 32 +++++++++
> kernel/exit.c | 4 ++
> kernel/fork.c | 142 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++--------
> kernel/signal.c | 26 ++++---
> kernel/sys_ni.c | 1 +
> 21 files changed, 426 insertions(+), 52 deletions(-)
> create mode 100644 kernel/clonefd.c
> create mode 100644 kernel/clonefd.h
>
> --
> 2.1.4
>
Looks promising!
-Kees
--
Kees Cook
Chrome OS Security
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