Re: [PATCH] avoid race condition between start_xmit and cm_rep_handler

On Wed, Aug 15, 2018 at 09:11:49PM -0400, Aaron Knister wrote:

Inside of start_xmit() the call to check if the connection is up and the queueing of the packets for later transmission is not atomic which leaves a window where cm_rep_handler can run, set the connection up, dequeue pending packets and leave the subsequently queued packets by start_xmit() sitting on neigh->queue until they're dropped when the connection is torn down. This only applies to connected mode. These dropped packets can really upset TCP, for example, and cause multi-minute delays in transmission for open connections.

I've got a reproducer available if it's needed.

Here's the code in start_xmit where we check to see if the connection is up:

   if (ipoib_cm_get(neigh)) {
           if (ipoib_cm_up(neigh)) {
                   ipoib_cm_send(dev, skb, ipoib_cm_get(neigh));
                   goto unref;
           }
   }

The race occurs if cm_rep_handler execution occurs after the above connection check (specifically if it gets to the point where it acquires priv->lock to dequeue pending skb's) but before the below code snippet in start_xmit where packets are queued.

   if (skb_queue_len(&neigh->queue) < IPOIB_MAX_PATH_REC_QUEUE) {
           push_pseudo_header(skb, phdr->hwaddr);
           spin_lock_irqsave(&priv->lock, flags);
           __skb_queue_tail(&neigh->queue, skb);
           spin_unlock_irqrestore(&priv->lock, flags);
   } else {
           ++dev->stats.tx_dropped;
           dev_kfree_skb_any(skb);
   }

The patch re-checks ipoib_cm_up with priv->lock held to avoid this race condition. Since odds are the conn should be up most of the time (and thus the connection *not* down most of the time) we don't hold the lock for the first check attempt to avoid a slowdown from unecessary locking for the majority of the packets transmitted during the connection's life.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org Tested-by: Ira Weiny ira.weiny@intel.com Signed-off-by: Aaron Knister aaron.s.knister@nasa.gov

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Sorry, but no mainly for two reasons: 1. Don't lock/unlock in different functions. 2. Don't create unbalanced number of lock/unlocks.

Thanks