Re: [PATCH] s390/cmm: Account for NUL when calculating 'len' in cmm_timeout_handler

Heiko Carstens
2025-12-22T11:00:21Z

On Thu, Dec 18, 2025 at 08:57:24AM +0100, Alexander Gordeev wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 15, 2025 at 01:22:14PM +0100, Thorsten Blum wrote:
> > When the input length 'lenp' equals sizeof(buf), the current code copies
> > all 64 bytes, but then immediately overwrites the last byte with a NUL
> > terminator. Limit the number of bytes to copy to 'sizeof(buf) - 1' to
> > reserve space for the NUL terminator.
>
> I see you point, but can not see much of the benefit. Besides,
> to me buf[len] = '\0' rings like a past-end-of-the-buffer access
> (although it is not, it feels like that on a cursory look).
>
> > Signed-off-by: Thorsten Blum <thorsten.blum@linux.dev>
> > ---
> > arch/s390/mm/cmm.c | 4 ++--
> > 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> >
> > diff --git a/arch/s390/mm/cmm.c b/arch/s390/mm/cmm.c
> > index eb7ef63fab1e..06512bc178a5 100644
> > --- a/arch/s390/mm/cmm.c
> > +++ b/arch/s390/mm/cmm.c
> > @@ -311,9 +311,9 @@ static int cmm_timeout_handler(const struct ctl_table *ctl, int write,
> > }
> >
> > if (write) {
> > - len = min(*lenp, sizeof(buf));
> > + len = min(*lenp, sizeof(buf) - 1);
> > memcpy(buf, buffer, len);
> > - buf[len - 1] = '\0';
> > + buf[len] = '\0';

Well, I don't see any point at all: the compiler is able to tell the
same and may or may not generate code accordingly to what this patch
tries to improve. This patch is pointless.