Re: [PATCH] coredump, vmcore: Set p_align to 4 for PT_NOTE

[Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>]

On Fri, May 12, 2023 at 02:25:28AM +0000, Fangrui Song wrote:
> Tools like readelf/llvm-readelf use p_align to parse a PT_NOTE program
> header as an array of 4-byte entries or 8-byte entries. Currently, there
> are workarounds[1] in place for Linux to treat p_align==0 as 4. However,
> it would be more appropriate to set the correct alignment so that tools
> do not have to rely on guesswork. FreeBSD coredumps set p_align to 4 as
> well.
>
> [1]: https://sourceware.org/git/?p=binutils-gdb.git;a=commit;h=82ed9683ec099d8205dc499ac84febc975235af6

The interesting bit from here is:

  /* NB: Some note sections may have alignment value of 0 or 1.  gABI
     specifies that notes should be aligned to 4 bytes in 32-bit
     objects and to 8 bytes in 64-bit objects.  As a Linux extension,
     we also support 4 byte alignment in 64-bit objects.  If section
     alignment is less than 4, we treate alignment as 4 bytes.   */
  if (align < 4)
    align = 4;
  else if (align != 4 && align != 8)
    {
      warn (_("Corrupt note: alignment %ld, expecting 4 or 8\n"),
           (long) align);
      return FALSE;
    }

Should Linux use 8 for 64-bit processes to avoid the other special case?

(And do we need to make some changes to make sure we are actually
aligned?)

-Kees

-- 
Kees Cook