With CONFIG_PREEMPT && !CONFIG_SMP, it's possible for sys_getppid to
return a bogus value if the parent's task_struct gets reallocated after
current->group_leader->real_parent is read:
asmlinkage long sys_getppid(void)
{
int pid;
struct task_struct *me = current;
struct task_struct *parent;
parent = me->group_leader->real_parent;
RACE HERE => for (;;) {
pid = parent->tgid;
#ifdef CONFIG_SMP
{
struct task_struct *old = parent;
/*
* Make sure we read the pid before re-reading the
* parent pointer:
*/
smp_rmb();
parent = me->group_leader->real_parent;
if (old != parent)
continue;
}
#endif
break;
}
return pid;
}
If the process gets preempted at the indicated point, the parent process
can go ahead and call exit() and then get wait()'d on to reap its
task_struct. When the preempted process gets resumed, it will not do any
further checks of the parent pointer on !CONFIG_SMP: it will read the
bad pid and return.
So, the same algorithm used when SMP is enabled should be used when
preempt is enabled, which will recheck ->real_parent in this case.
Signed-off-by: David Meybohm <dmeybohmlkml@bellsouth.net> Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@osdl.org> Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@osdl.org>