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Date:   Thu, 5 Sep 2019 08:15:02 -0500
From:   Josh Poimboeuf <jpoimboe@redhat.com>
To:     Petr Mladek <pmladek@suse.com>
Cc:     jikos@kernel.org, Joe Lawrence <joe.lawrence@redhat.com>,
        Miroslav Benes <mbenes@suse.cz>, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
        live-patching@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [RFC PATCH 2/2] livepatch: Clear relocation targets on a module
 removal
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On Thu, Sep 05, 2019 at 08:08:32AM -0500, Josh Poimboeuf wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 05, 2019 at 01:09:55PM +0200, Petr Mladek wrote:
> > > I don't have a number, but it's very common to patch a function which
> > > uses jump labels or alternatives.
> > 
> > Really? My impression is that both alternatives and jump_labels
> > are used in hot paths. I would expect them mostly in core code
> > that is always loaded.
> > 
> > Alternatives are often used in assembly that we are not able
> > to livepatch anyway.
> > 
> > Or are they spread widely via some macros or inlined functions?
> 
> Jump labels are used everywhere.  Looking at vmlinux.o in my kernel:
> 
>   Relocation section [19621] '.rela__jump_table' for section [19620] '__jump_table' at offset 0x197873c8 contains 11913 entries:
> 
> Each jump label entry has 3 entries, so 11913/3 = 3971 jump labels.
> 
> $ readelf -s vmlinux.o |grep FUNC |wc -l
> 46902
> 
> 3971/46902 = ~8.5%
> 
> ~8.5% of functions use jump labels.

Obviously some functions may use more than one jump label so this isn't
exactly bulletproof math.  But it gives a rough idea of how widespread
they are.

> 
> > > >       + How often new problematic features appear?
> > > 
> > > I'm not exactly sure what you mean, but it seems that anytime we add a
> > > new feature, we have to try to wrap our heads around how it interacts
> > > with the weirdness of late module patching.
> > 
> > I agree that we need to think about it and it makes complications.
> > Anyway, I think that these are never the biggest problems.
> > 
> > I would be more concerned about arch-specific features that might need
> > special handling in the livepatch code. Everyone talks only about
> > alternatives and jump_labels that were added long time ago.
> 
> Jump labels have been around for many years, but we somehow missed
> implementing klp.arch for them.  As I said this resulted in panics.
> 
> There may be other similar cases lurking, both in x86 and other arches.
> It's not a comforting thought!
> 
> And each case requires special klp code in addition to the real code.
> 
> -- 
> Josh

-- 
Josh