• Johannes Berg's avatar
    net: ensure net_todo_list is processed quickly · 0b5c21bb
    Johannes Berg authored
    In [1], Will raised a potential issue that the cfg80211 code,
    which does (from a locking perspective)
    
      rtnl_lock()
      wiphy_lock()
      rtnl_unlock()
    
    might be suspectible to ABBA deadlocks, because rtnl_unlock()
    calls netdev_run_todo(), which might end up calling rtnl_lock()
    again, which could then deadlock (see the comment in the code
    added here for the scenario).
    
    Some back and forth and thinking ensued, but clearly this can't
    happen if the net_todo_list is empty at the rtnl_unlock() here.
    Clearly, the code here cannot actually put an entry on it, and
    all other users of rtnl_unlock() will empty it since that will
    always go through netdev_run_todo(), emptying the list.
    
    So the only other way to get there would be to add to the list
    and then unlock the RTNL without going through rtnl_unlock(),
    which is only possible through __rtnl_unlock(). However, this
    isn't exported and not used in many places, and none of them
    seem to be able to unregister before using it.
    
    Therefore, add a WARN_ON() in the code to ensure this invariant
    won't be broken, so that the cfg80211 (or any similar) code
    stays safe.
    
    [1] https://lore.kernel.org/r/Yjzpo3TfZxtKPMAG@google.comSigned-off-by: default avatarJohannes Berg <johannes.berg@intel.com>
    Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20220404113847.0ee02e4a70da.Ic73d206e217db20fd22dcec14fe5442ca732804b@changeidSigned-off-by: default avatarJakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
    0b5c21bb
dev.c 284 KB