mutex: force serialization on mutex_exit() to fix races

It is known that mutexes in Linux are not safe when using them to
synchronize the freeing of object in which the mutex is embedded:

http://lwn.net/Articles/575477/

The known places in ZFS which are suspected to suffer from the race
condition are zio->io_lock and dbuf->db_mtx.

* zio uses zio->io_lock and zio->io_cv to synchronize freeing
  between zio_wait() and zio_done().
* dbuf uses dbuf->db_mtx to protect reference counting.

This patch fixes this kind of race by forcing serialization on
mutex_exit() with a spin lock, making the mutex safe by sacrificing
a bit of performance and memory overhead.

This issue most commonly manifests itself as a deadlock in the zio
pipeline caused by a process spinning on the damaged mutex.  Similar
deadlocks have been reported for the dbuf->db_mtx mutex.  And it can
also cause a NULL dereference or bad paging request under the right
circumstances.

This issue any many like it are linked off the zfsonlinux/zfs#2523
issue.  Specifically this fix resolves at least the following
outstanding issues:

zfsonlinux/zfs#401
zfsonlinux/zfs#2523
zfsonlinux/zfs#2679
zfsonlinux/zfs#2684
zfsonlinux/zfs#2704
zfsonlinux/zfs#2708
zfsonlinux/zfs#2517
zfsonlinux/zfs#2827
zfsonlinux/zfs#2850
zfsonlinux/zfs#2891
zfsonlinux/zfs#2897
zfsonlinux/zfs#2247
zfsonlinux/zfs#2939

Signed-off-by: Chunwei Chen <tuxoko@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Brian Behlendorf <behlendorf1@llnl.gov>
Signed-off-by: Richard Yao <ryao@gentoo.org>
Closes #421

diff --git a/include/sys/mutex.h b/include/sys/mutex.h
index d946ff366974aaacfb476bb5d7e2afa4959bfd87..31497f6a1f49cb7af911b5205bc052b75c804a36 100644 (file)
--- a/include/sys/mutex.h
+++ b/include/sys/mutex.h
@@ -44,6 +44,7 @@ typedef enum {
  */
 typedef struct {
         struct mutex m;
+       spinlock_t m_lock;      /* used for serializing mutex_exit */
 } kmutex_t;
 
 static inline kthread_t *
@@ -70,6 +71,7 @@ mutex_owner(kmutex_t *mp)
         ASSERT(type == MUTEX_DEFAULT);                                  \
                                                                         \
         __mutex_init(&(mp)->m, #mp, &__key);                            \
+       spin_lock_init(&(mp)->m_lock);                                  \
 })
 
 #undef mutex_destroy
@@ -84,12 +86,37 @@ mutex_owner(kmutex_t *mp)
         ASSERT3P(mutex_owner(mp), !=, current);                                \
         mutex_lock(&(mp)->m);                                          \
 })
-#define mutex_exit(mp)                  mutex_unlock(&(mp)->m)
+/*
+ * The reason for the spinlock:
+ *
+ * The Linux mutex is designed with a fast-path/slow-path design such that it
+ * does not guarantee serialization upon itself, allowing a race where latter
+ * acquirers finish mutex_unlock before former ones.
+ *
+ * The race renders it unsafe to be used for serializing the freeing of an
+ * object in which the mutex is embedded, where the latter acquirer could go
+ * on to free the object while the former one is still doing mutex_unlock and
+ * causing memory corruption.
+ *
+ * However, there are many places in ZFS where the mutex is used for
+ * serializing object freeing, and the code is shared among other OSes without
+ * this issue. Thus, we need the spinlock to force the serialization on
+ * mutex_exit().
+ *
+ * See http://lwn.net/Articles/575477/ for the information about the race.
+ */
+#define mutex_exit(mp)                                                 \
+({                                                                     \
+       spin_lock(&(mp)->m_lock);                                       \
+       mutex_unlock(&(mp)->m);                                         \
+       spin_unlock(&(mp)->m_lock);                                     \
+})
 
 #else /* HAVE_MUTEX_OWNER */
 
 typedef struct {
         struct mutex m_mutex;
+       spinlock_t m_lock;
         kthread_t *m_owner;
 } kmutex_t;
 
@@ -125,6 +152,7 @@ spl_mutex_clear_owner(kmutex_t *mp)
         ASSERT(type == MUTEX_DEFAULT);                                  \
                                                                         \
         __mutex_init(MUTEX(mp), #mp, &__key);                           \
+       spin_lock_init(&(mp)->m_lock);                                  \
         spl_mutex_clear_owner(mp);                                      \
 })
 
@@ -153,8 +181,10 @@ spl_mutex_clear_owner(kmutex_t *mp)
 
 #define mutex_exit(mp)                                                  \
 ({                                                                      \
+       spin_lock(&(mp)->m_lock);                                       \
         spl_mutex_clear_owner(mp);                                      \
         mutex_unlock(MUTEX(mp));                                        \
+       spin_unlock(&(mp)->m_lock);                                     \
 })
 
 #endif /* HAVE_MUTEX_OWNER */