On 07/15/2018 04:04 AM, Kees Cook wrote: > On Wed, Jul 4, 2018 at 10:47 AM, Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@xxxxxxx> wrote: >> On 07/04/2018 06:52 PM, Kees Cook wrote: >>> This produces less efficient code in the general case, and I'd like to >>> keep the general case (hardening enabled) as fast as possible. >> >> How specifically is the code less efficient? It should be always a >> static key check (no-op thanks to the code patching involved) and a >> function call in the "hardening enabled" case, just in different order. >> And in either case compiled out if it's a constant. > > My understanding from reading the jump label comments[1] is that on > order produces: > > NOP > do normal thing > label1: > do rest of function > RET > label2: > do exceptional thing > jump label1 > > where "NOP" is changed to "JMP label2" when toggled, and the other is: > > JMP label1 > do exceptional thing > JMP label2 > label1: > do normal thing > label2: > do rest of function > RET > > where "JMP label1" is changed to NOP when toggled. (i.e. does the > default do NOP, thing, function, or does the default to JMP, thing, > JMP, function) My mistake, sorry. I didn't mean to change likely() to unlikely(). Also I didn't negate the condition. The correct code is: if (!__builtin_constant_p(n) && !static_branch_unlikely(&bypass_usercopy_checks)) __check_object_size(ptr, n, to_user); I've test-compiled it, did objdump -d and checked few call sites and they seem to be preceded just y NOP, so it's the first case you mentioned above, as expected - calling __check_object_size() is treated as the "normal thing".