On 11/03/2010 06:09 PM, Dave Hansen wrote:
70 hours into some stress tests of a 2.6.32-based enterprise kernel, we ran into a NULL dereference in here: int block_is_partially_uptodate(struct page *page, read_descriptor_t *desc, unsigned long from) { ----> struct inode *inode = page->mapping->host; It looks like page->mapping was the culprit. (xmon trace is below). After closer examination, I realized that do_generic_file_read() does a find_get_page(), and eventually locks the page before calling block_is_partially_uptodate(). However, it doesn't revalidate the page->mapping after the page is locked. So, there's a small window between the find_get_page() and ->is_partially_uptodate() where the page could get truncated and page->mapping cleared. We _have_ a reference, so it can't get reclaimed, but it certainly can be truncated.
Acked-by: Rik van Riel <riel@xxxxxxxxxx> -- All rights reversed -- To unsubscribe, send a message with 'unsubscribe linux-mm' in the body to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxx For more info on Linux MM, see: http://www.linux-mm.org/ . Fight unfair telecom policy in Canada: sign http://dissolvethecrtc.ca/ Don't email: <a href=mailto:"dont@xxxxxxxxx"> email@xxxxxxxxx </a>