Re: gold linker 2.22 regressed for DragonFly [revised testsuite results]

[John Marino <binutils at marino dot st>]

On 1/6/2012 3:42 PM, Ian Lance Taylor wrote:
> John Marino <binutils@marino.st> writes:
> 
>> On 1/5/2012 7:31 PM, Ian Lance Taylor wrote:
>>>> 2. ver_matching_test.sh:  __bss_start not local, rtld issue? real issue? (failed on v2.21 too)
>>>
>>> Hard to understand why this would fail.  The __bss_start symbol is
>>> defined automatically by the linker itself.
>>
>> ok.  I thought I remembered seeing references to __bss_start in rtld
>> code, so I suspected rtld was the culprit.
> 
> Ideally rtld should not have a publically visible definition of
> __bss_start, but I don't see how it would cause a test failure even if
> it did.
> 
> 
>>>> 3. exception_static_test: likely real problem.  gdb log attached
>>>
>>> My first guess would be that DragonFly does not support dl_iterate_phdr,
>>> or that it does not work correctly for statically linked executables.
>>> That's just a guess, though.
>>
>> I brought in dl_iterate_phdr support to dragonfly (system compiler is
>> 4.4.7 snapshot, 2011-10-25), and it appears to be working although
>> maybe in the case of statically linked executables it's not.  What
>> handles the latter?  Is that an rtld thing?
> 
> Statically linked executables don't use rtld at all.  They need to use a
> completely different mechanism to get the program segments, typically
> just the single set associated with the executable itself.  On GNU/Linux
> systems the kernel passes the program segments in the auxiliary vector
> using AT_PHDR and AT_PHNUM, and the startup code saves those for use by
> dl_iterate_phdr in a static executable.
> 
> 
>>>> 4. intpri2:               likely real problem.  gdb log attached
>>>
>>> This is almost certainly the same issue as the --no-ctors-in-init-array
>>> issue: DragonFly does not suppor DT_INIT_ARRAY.
>>
>> If I wanted to add DT_INIT_ARRAY support to DragonFly, what component
>> needs to be updated?  again rtld?
> 
> Yes.  Also you need to do some magic for statically linked executables,
> taking advantage of the linker-defined symbols __init_array_start and
> __init_array_end and friends.
> 
> 
>>>> 5. relro_test:            no relro support in rtld, ignore
>>>> 6. relro_now_test:        no relro support in rtld, ignore
>>>> 7. relro_strip_test:      no relro support in rtld, ignore
>>>
>>> Yeah, if the dynamic linker does not handle relro, then these tests are
>>> expected to fail.
>>
>> As far as I can tell, no BSD supports relro and it seems to be of
>> limited value so I don't suspect this will change any time soon.
> 
> I'm surprised that no BSD supports relro as it is a security
> enhancement.  I agree that the value is limited but it is not zero.
> 
> In my opinion, the biggest advantage is for the PLT.  The PLT must often
> be writable when the program starts, so that dynamic relocations can be
> applied.  The PLT holds code addresses, so this gives various sorts of
> overflow attacks a way to change which code will execute, by overwriting
> the PLT.
> 
> The point of relro is that after all the PLT relocations have been
> applied, there is no need for the PLT to change again.  Making the PLT
> be relro implements that: the dynamic linker applies the relocations,
> then uses mprotect to make the PLT readonly.
> 
> This does of course require that the PLT be fully relocated at program
> startup time, rather than using lazy PLT relocations which is the
> default behaviour.  You can use the linker option -z now to request that
> all PLT relocations be fully relocated at program startup, and when gold
> sees -z now it will make the PLT a relro section.
> 
> Ian

Thanks for your detailed response, Ian.
I try to get smart on these topics and hopefully incorporate some
improvements in DragonFly as a result of this discussion.

Regards,
John