Re: [PATCH 6/7] x86/spec_ctrl: Add sysctl knobs to enable/disable SPEC_CTRL feature

Tim Chen
2018-01-06T01:29:30Z

On 01/05/2018 03:16 AM, David Woodhouse wrote:
> On Thu, 2018-01-04 at 09:56 -0800, Tim Chen wrote:
>>
>> + mutex_lock(&spec_ctrl_mutex);
>> +
>> + if (enable == IBRS_DISABLED) {
>> + /* disable IBRS usage */
>> + set_ibrs_disabled();
>> + if (spec_ctrl_ibrs & SPEC_CTRL_IBRS_SUPPORTED)
>> + spec_ctrl_flush_all_cpus(MSR_IA32_SPEC_CTRL, SPEC_CTRL_FEATURE_DISABLE_IBRS);
>> + } else if (enable == IBRS_ENABLED) {
>> + /* enable IBRS usage in kernel */
>> + clear_ibrs_disabled();
>> + if (spec_ctrl_ibrs & SPEC_CTRL_IBRS_SUPPORTED)
>> + set_ibrs_inuse();
>> + else
>> + /* Platform don't support IBRS */
>> + enable = IBRS_DISABLED;
>> + } else if (enable == IBRS_ENABLED_USER) {
>> + /* enable IBRS usage in both userspace and kernel */
>> + clear_ibrs_disabled();
>> + /* don't change IBRS value once we set it to always on */
>> + clear_ibrs_inuse();
>> + if (spec_ctrl_ibrs & SPEC_CTRL_IBRS_SUPPORTED)
>> + spec_ctrl_flush_all_cpus(MSR_IA32_SPEC_CTRL, SPEC_CTRL_FEATURE_ENABLE_IBRS);
>> + else
>> + /* Platform don't support IBRS */
>> + enable = IBRS_DISABLED;
>> + }
>
> This doesn't take the retpoline status into account. If we have
> retpoline, we don't need IBRS in the kernel.
>

If retpoline is used, we don't enable IBRS automatically during feature detection.
But if the admin is paranoid, he still has the choice to explicitly issue
a command to enable IBRS here.

Tim