Re: [PATCH v2 10/20] x86: avoid W^X being broken during modules loading

Andy Lutomirski
2019-03-07T20:02:29Z

On Thu, Mar 7, 2019 at 9:06 AM Borislav Petkov <bp@alien8.de> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Mar 07, 2019 at 08:53:34AM -0800, hpa@zytor.com wrote:
> > If we *do*, what is the issue here? Although boot_cpu_has() isn't
> > slow (it should in general be possible to reduce to one testb
> > instruction followed by a conditional jump) it seems that "avoiding an
> > alternatives slot" *should* be a *very* weak reason, and seems to me
> > to look like papering over some other problem.
>
> Forget the current thread: this is simply trying to document when to use
> static_cpu_has() and when to use boot_cpu_has(). I get asked about it at
> least once a month.
>
> And then it is replacing clear slow paths using static_cpu_has() with
> boot_cpu_has() because there's purely no need to patch there. And having
> a RIP-relative MOV and a JMP is good enough for slow paths.
>

Should we maybe rename these functions? static_cpu_has() is at least
reasonably obvious. But cpu_feature_enabled() is different for
reasons I've never understood, and boot_cpu_has() is IMO terribly
named. It's not about the boot cpu -- it's about doing the same thing
but with less bloat and less performance.

(And can we maybe collapse cpu_feature_enabled() and static_cpu_has()
into the same function?)

--Andy