Currently, if user-supplied log buffer to collect BPF verifier log turns
out to be too small to contain full log, bpf() syscall returns -ENOSPC,
fails BPF program verification/load, and preserves first N-1 bytes of
the verifier log (where N is the size of user-supplied buffer).
This is problematic in a bunch of common scenarios, especially when
working with real-world BPF programs that tend to be pretty complex as
far as verification goes and require big log buffers. Typically, it's
when debugging tricky cases at log level 2 (verbose). Also, when BPF program
is successfully validated, log level 2 is the only way to actually see
verifier state progression and all the important details.
Even with log level 1, it's possible to get -ENOSPC even if the final
verifier log fits in log buffer, if there is a code path that's deep
enough to fill up entire log, even if normally it would be reset later
on (there is a logic to chop off successfully validated portions of BPF
verifier log).
In short, it's not always possible to pre-size log buffer. Also, what's
worse, in practice, the end of the log most often is way more important
than the beginning, but verifier stops emitting log as soon as initial
log buffer is filled up.
This patch switches BPF verifier log behavior to effectively behave as
rotating log. That is, if user-supplied log buffer turns out to be too
short, verifier will keep overwriting previously written log,
effectively treating user's log buffer as a ring buffer. -ENOSPC is
still going to be returned at the end, to notify user that log contents
was truncated, but the important last N bytes of the log would be
returned, which might be all that user really needs. This consistent
-ENOSPC behavior, regardless of rotating or fixed log behavior, allows
to prevent backwards compatibility breakage. The only user-visible
change is which portion of verifier log user ends up seeing *if buffer
is too small*. Given contents of verifier log itself is not an ABI,
there is no breakage due to this behavior change. Specialized tools that
rely on specific contents of verifier log in -ENOSPC scenario are
expected to be easily adapted to accommodate old and new behaviors.
Importantly, though, to preserve good user experience and not require
every user-space application to adopt to this new behavior, before
exiting to user-space verifier will rotate log (in place) to make it
start at the very beginning of user buffer as a continuous
zero-terminated string. The contents will be a chopped off N-1 last
bytes of full verifier log, of course.
Given beginning of log is sometimes important as well, we add
BPF_LOG_FIXED (which equals 8) flag to force old behavior, which allows
tools like veristat to request first part of verifier log, if necessary.
BPF_LOG_FIXED flag is also a simple and straightforward way to check if
BPF verifier supports rotating behavior.
On the implementation side, conceptually, it's all simple. We maintain
64-bit logical start and end positions. If we need to truncate the log,
start position will be adjusted accordingly to lag end position by
N bytes. We then use those logical positions to calculate their matching
actual positions in user buffer and handle wrap around the end of the
buffer properly. Finally, right before returning from bpf_check(), we
rotate user log buffer contents in-place as necessary, to make log
contents contiguous. See comments in relevant functions for details.
Signed-off-by: Andrii Nakryiko <andrii@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Daniel Borkmann <daniel@iogearbox.net>
Reviewed-by: Lorenz Bauer <lmb@isovalent.com>
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/bpf/20230406234205.323208-4-andrii@kernel.org
Linux kernel
============
There are several guides for kernel developers and users. These guides can
be rendered in a number of formats, like HTML and PDF. Please read
Documentation/admin-guide/README.rst first.
In order to build the documentation, use ``make htmldocs`` or
``make pdfdocs``. The formatted documentation can also be read online at:
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/
There are various text files in the Documentation/ subdirectory,
several of them using the Restructured Text markup notation.
Please read the Documentation/process/changes.rst file, as it contains the
requirements for building and running the kernel, and information about
the problems which may result by upgrading your kernel.
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