xref: /openbmc/qemu/include/user/safe-syscall.h (revision 2f3e5e4c08c43daeec144adeeae9138176039b60)
1  /*
2   * safe-syscall.h: prototypes for linux-user signal-race-safe syscalls
3   *
4   *  This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
5   *  it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
6   *  the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
7   *  (at your option) any later version.
8   *
9   *  This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
10   *  but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
11   *  MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
12   *  GNU General Public License for more details.
13   *
14   *  You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
15   *  along with this program; if not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
16   */
17  
18  #ifndef LINUX_USER_SAFE_SYSCALL_H
19  #define LINUX_USER_SAFE_SYSCALL_H
20  
21  /**
22   * safe_syscall:
23   * @int number: number of system call to make
24   * ...: arguments to the system call
25   *
26   * Call a system call if guest signal not pending.
27   * This has the same API as the libc syscall() function, except that it
28   * may return -1 with errno == QEMU_ERESTARTSYS if a signal was pending.
29   *
30   * Returns: the system call result, or -1 with an error code in errno
31   * (Errnos are host errnos; we rely on QEMU_ERESTARTSYS not clashing
32   * with any of the host errno values.)
33   */
34  
35  /*
36   * A guide to using safe_syscall() to handle interactions between guest
37   * syscalls and guest signals:
38   *
39   * Guest syscalls come in two flavours:
40   *
41   * (1) Non-interruptible syscalls
42   *
43   * These are guest syscalls that never get interrupted by signals and
44   * so never return EINTR. They can be implemented straightforwardly in
45   * QEMU: just make sure that if the implementation code has to make any
46   * blocking calls that those calls are retried if they return EINTR.
47   * It's also OK to implement these with safe_syscall, though it will be
48   * a little less efficient if a signal is delivered at the 'wrong' moment.
49   *
50   * Some non-interruptible syscalls need to be handled using block_signals()
51   * to block signals for the duration of the syscall. This mainly applies
52   * to code which needs to modify the data structures used by the
53   * host_signal_handler() function and the functions it calls, including
54   * all syscalls which change the thread's signal mask.
55   *
56   * (2) Interruptible syscalls
57   *
58   * These are guest syscalls that can be interrupted by signals and
59   * for which we need to either return EINTR or arrange for the guest
60   * syscall to be restarted. This category includes both syscalls which
61   * always restart (and in the kernel return -ERESTARTNOINTR), ones
62   * which only restart if there is no handler (kernel returns -ERESTARTNOHAND
63   * or -ERESTART_RESTARTBLOCK), and the most common kind which restart
64   * if the handler was registered with SA_RESTART (kernel returns
65   * -ERESTARTSYS). System calls which are only interruptible in some
66   * situations (like 'open') also need to be handled this way.
67   *
68   * Here it is important that the host syscall is made
69   * via this safe_syscall() function, and *not* via the host libc.
70   * If the host libc is used then the implementation will appear to work
71   * most of the time, but there will be a race condition where a
72   * signal could arrive just before we make the host syscall inside libc,
73   * and then the guest syscall will not correctly be interrupted.
74   * Instead the implementation of the guest syscall can use the safe_syscall
75   * function but otherwise just return the result or errno in the usual
76   * way; the main loop code will take care of restarting the syscall
77   * if appropriate.
78   *
79   * (If the implementation needs to make multiple host syscalls this is
80   * OK; any which might really block must be via safe_syscall(); for those
81   * which are only technically blocking (ie which we know in practice won't
82   * stay in the host kernel indefinitely) it's OK to use libc if necessary.
83   * You must be able to cope with backing out correctly if some safe_syscall
84   * you make in the implementation returns either -QEMU_ERESTARTSYS or
85   * EINTR though.)
86   *
87   * block_signals() cannot be used for interruptible syscalls.
88   *
89   *
90   * How and why the safe_syscall implementation works:
91   *
92   * The basic setup is that we make the host syscall via a known
93   * section of host native assembly. If a signal occurs, our signal
94   * handler checks the interrupted host PC against the address of that
95   * known section. If the PC is before or at the address of the syscall
96   * instruction then we change the PC to point at a "return
97   * -QEMU_ERESTARTSYS" code path instead, and then exit the signal handler
98   * (causing the safe_syscall() call to immediately return that value).
99   * Then in the main.c loop if we see this magic return value we adjust
100   * the guest PC to wind it back to before the system call, and invoke
101   * the guest signal handler as usual.
102   *
103   * This winding-back will happen in two cases:
104   * (1) signal came in just before we took the host syscall (a race);
105   *   in this case we'll take the guest signal and have another go
106   *   at the syscall afterwards, and this is indistinguishable for the
107   *   guest from the timing having been different such that the guest
108   *   signal really did win the race
109   * (2) signal came in while the host syscall was blocking, and the
110   *   host kernel decided the syscall should be restarted;
111   *   in this case we want to restart the guest syscall also, and so
112   *   rewinding is the right thing. (Note that "restart" semantics mean
113   *   "first call the signal handler, then reattempt the syscall".)
114   * The other situation to consider is when a signal came in while the
115   * host syscall was blocking, and the host kernel decided that the syscall
116   * should not be restarted; in this case QEMU's host signal handler will
117   * be invoked with the PC pointing just after the syscall instruction,
118   * with registers indicating an EINTR return; the special code in the
119   * handler will not kick in, and we will return EINTR to the guest as
120   * we should.
121   *
122   * Notice that we can leave the host kernel to make the decision for
123   * us about whether to do a restart of the syscall or not; we do not
124   * need to check SA_RESTART flags in QEMU or distinguish the various
125   * kinds of restartability.
126   */
127  
128  /* The core part of this function is implemented in assembly */
129  long safe_syscall_base(int *pending, long number, ...);
130  long safe_syscall_set_errno_tail(int value);
131  
132  /* These are defined by the safe-syscall.inc.S file */
133  extern char safe_syscall_start[];
134  extern char safe_syscall_end[];
135  
136  #define safe_syscall(...)                                                 \
137      safe_syscall_base(&get_task_state(thread_cpu)->signal_pending,        \
138                        __VA_ARGS__)
139  
140  #endif
141