On Tue, Nov 16, 2021 at 7:37 AM Christophe Leroy
<christophe.leroy@...> wrote:

Le 15/11/2021 à 17:06, Steven Rostedt a écrit :

On Mon, 15 Nov 2021 14:59:57 +0100
Lukas Bulwahn <lukas.bulwahn@...> wrote:

1. Allow a reasonably configured kernel to boot and run with
panic_on_warn set. Warnings should only be raised when something is
not configured as the developers expect it or the kernel is put into a
state that generally is _unexpected_ and has been exposed little to
the critical thought of the developer, to testing efforts and use in
other systems in the wild. Warnings should not be used for something
informative, which still allows the kernel to continue running in a
proper way in a generally expected environment. Up to my knowledge,
there are some kernels in production that run with panic_on_warn; so,
IMHO, this requirement is generally accepted (we might of course

To me, WARN*() is the same as BUG*(). If it gets hit, it's a bug in the
kernel and needs to be fixed. I have several WARN*() calls in my code, and
it's all because the algorithms used is expected to prevent the condition
in the warning from happening. If the warning triggers, it means either that
the algorithm is wrong or my assumption about the algorithm is wrong. In
either case, the kernel needs to be updated. All my tests fail if a WARN*()
gets hit (anywhere in the kernel, not just my own).

After reading all the replies and thinking about this more, I find the
pkill_on_warning actually worse than not doing anything. If you are
concerned about exploits from warnings, the only real solution is a
panic_on_warning. Yes, it brings down the system, but really, it has to be
brought down anyway, because it is in need of a kernel update.

We also have LIVEPATCH to avoid bringing down the system for a kernel
update, don't we ? So I wouldn't expect bringing down a vital system
just for a WARN.

As far as I understand from
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/process/deprecated.html#bug-and-bug-on,
WARN() and WARN_ON() are meant to deal with those situations as
gracefull as possible, allowing the system to continue running the best
it can until a human controled action is taken.

So I'd expect the WARN/WARN_ON to be handled and I agree that that
pkill_on_warning seems dangerous and unrelevant, probably more dangerous
than doing nothing, especially as the WARN may trigger for a reason
which has nothing to do with the running thread.

Christophe,

I agree with a reasonable goal that WARN() should allow users "to deal
with those situations as gracefull as possible, allowing the system to
continue running the best it can until a human controled action is
taken."

However, that makes me wonder even more: what does the system after a
WARN() invocation still need to provide as properly working
functionality, so that the human can take action, and how can the
kernel indicate to the whole user applications that a certain
functionality is not working anymore and how adaptive can those user
application really be here? Making that explicit for every WARN()
invocation seems to be tricky and probably also quite error-prone. So,
in the end, after a WARN(), you end up running a system where you have
this uncomfortable feeling of a running system where some things work
and some things do not and it might be insecure (the whole system
security concept is invalidated, because security features do not
work, security holes are opened etc.) or other surprises happen.

The panic_on_warn implements a simple policy of that "run as graceful
as possible": We assume stopping the kernel is _graceful_, and we just
assume that the functionality "panic shuts down the system" still
works properly after any WARN() invocation. Once the system is shut
down, the human can take action and switch it into some (remote)
diagnostic mode for further analysis and repair.

I am wondering if that policy and that assumption holds for all WARN()
invocations in the kernel? I would hope that we can answer this
question, which is much simpler than getting the precise answer on
"what as graceful as possible actually means".

Lukas