On Sat, Oct 29, 2016 at 10:47:58AM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote: > Also, honestly, make it use a helper: "aio_file_start_write()" and > "aio_file_end_write()" that has the comments and the lockdep games. > > Because that patch is just too effing ugly. > > Does something like the attached work for you guys? No. The use-after-free problem is real, nasty and only papered over by that patch. What happens is that io_submit_one() * allocates aio_kiocb * does fget() and stuffs the struct file * into kiocb * in case of early problems we call kiocb_free(), freeing kiocb and doing fput() on file, then bugger off. * otherwise, eventually we get to passing that iocb to ->read_iter()/->write_iter(). * if that has resulted in anything other than -EIOCBQUEUED, we call aio_complete(), which calls kiocb_free(), freeing kiocb and doing fput() on file. * if ->{read,write}_iter() returns -EIOCBQUEUED, we expect aio_complete() to be called asynchronously. And that call can happen as soon as we return from __blockdev_direct_IO() (even earlier, actually). As soon as that happens, the reference to struct file we'd acquired in io_submit_one() is dropped. If descriptor table had been shared, another thread might have already closed that sucker, and fput() from aio_complete() would free struct file. That's what this patch is papering over. Because if we hit that scenario and struct file *does* get closed asynchronously just as our ->write_iter() is returning from __blockdev_direct_IO(), we are fucked. Not only struct file might be freed - struct inode might've been gone too. And a bunch of ->write_iter/->read_iter instances do access struct inode after the call of __blockdev_direct_IO(). file_write_end() is just the tip of the iceberg - see examples I've posted today for the things we *can't* move around. -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-fsdevel" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html