linux/fs/ceph
Max Kellermann 6d5fd8bb57 ceph: fix i_nlink underrun during async unlink
commit ce0123cbb4 upstream.

During async unlink, we drop the `i_nlink` counter before we receive
the completion (that will eventually update the `i_nlink`) because "we
assume that the unlink will succeed".  That is not a bad idea, but it
races against deletions by other clients (or against the completion of
our own unlink) and can lead to an underrun which emits a WARNING like
this one:

 WARNING: CPU: 85 PID: 25093 at fs/inode.c:407 drop_nlink+0x50/0x68
 Modules linked in:
 CPU: 85 UID: 3221252029 PID: 25093 Comm: php-cgi8.1 Not tainted 6.14.11-cm4all1-ampere #655
 Hardware name: Supermicro ARS-110M-NR/R12SPD-A, BIOS 1.1b 10/17/2023
 pstate: 60400009 (nZCv daif +PAN -UAO -TCO -DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--)
 pc : drop_nlink+0x50/0x68
 lr : ceph_unlink+0x6c4/0x720
 sp : ffff80012173bc90
 x29: ffff80012173bc90 x28: ffff086d0a45aaf8 x27: ffff0871d0eb5680
 x26: ffff087f2a64a718 x25: 0000020000000180 x24: 0000000061c88647
 x23: 0000000000000002 x22: ffff07ff9236d800 x21: 0000000000001203
 x20: ffff07ff9237b000 x19: ffff088b8296afc0 x18: 00000000f3c93365
 x17: 0000000000070000 x16: ffff08faffcbdfe8 x15: ffff08faffcbdfec
 x14: 0000000000000000 x13: 45445f65645f3037 x12: 34385f6369706f74
 x11: 0000a2653104bb20 x10: ffffd85f26d73290 x9 : ffffd85f25664f94
 x8 : 00000000000000c0 x7 : 0000000000000000 x6 : 0000000000000002
 x5 : 0000000000000081 x4 : 0000000000000481 x3 : 0000000000000000
 x2 : 0000000000000000 x1 : 0000000000000000 x0 : ffff08727d3f91e8
 Call trace:
  drop_nlink+0x50/0x68 (P)
  vfs_unlink+0xb0/0x2e8
  do_unlinkat+0x204/0x288
  __arm64_sys_unlinkat+0x3c/0x80
  invoke_syscall.constprop.0+0x54/0xe8
  do_el0_svc+0xa4/0xc8
  el0_svc+0x18/0x58
  el0t_64_sync_handler+0x104/0x130
  el0t_64_sync+0x154/0x158

In ceph_unlink(), a call to ceph_mdsc_submit_request() submits the
CEPH_MDS_OP_UNLINK to the MDS, but does not wait for completion.

Meanwhile, between this call and the following drop_nlink() call, a
worker thread may process a CEPH_CAP_OP_IMPORT, CEPH_CAP_OP_GRANT or
just a CEPH_MSG_CLIENT_REPLY (the latter of which could be our own
completion).  These will lead to a set_nlink() call, updating the
`i_nlink` counter to the value received from the MDS.  If that new
`i_nlink` value happens to be zero, it is illegal to decrement it
further.  But that is exactly what ceph_unlink() will do then.

The WARNING can be reproduced this way:

1. Force async unlink; only the async code path is affected.  Having
   no real clue about Ceph internals, I was unable to find out why the
   MDS wouldn't give me the "Fxr" capabilities, so I patched
   get_caps_for_async_unlink() to always succeed.

   (Note that the WARNING dump above was found on an unpatched kernel,
   without this kludge - this is not a theoretical bug.)

2. Add a sleep call after ceph_mdsc_submit_request() so the unlink
   completion gets handled by a worker thread before drop_nlink() is
   called.  This guarantees that the `i_nlink` is already zero before
   drop_nlink() runs.

The solution is to skip the counter decrement when it is already zero,
but doing so without a lock is still racy (TOCTOU).  Since
ceph_fill_inode() and handle_cap_grant() both hold the
`ceph_inode_info.i_ceph_lock` spinlock while set_nlink() runs, this
seems like the proper lock to protect the `i_nlink` updates.

I found prior art in NFS and SMB (using `inode.i_lock`) and AFS (using
`afs_vnode.cb_lock`).  All three have the zero check as well.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Fixes: 2ccb45462a ("ceph: perform asynchronous unlink if we have sufficient caps")
Signed-off-by: Max Kellermann <max.kellermann@ionos.com>
Reviewed-by: Viacheslav Dubeyko <Slava.Dubeyko@ibm.com>
Signed-off-by: Ilya Dryomov <idryomov@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>
History 2026-04-18 10:33:14 +02:00
..
acl.c vfs: add rcu argument to ->get_acl() callback 2021-08-18 22:08:24 +02:00
addr.c ceph: remove the incorrect Fw reference check when dirtying pages 2024-10-17 15:11:19 +02:00
cache.c ceph: rip out old fscache readpage handling 2021-04-27 23:52:21 +02:00
cache.h ceph: remove some defunct forward declarations 2021-09-02 22:49:16 +02:00
caps.c ceph: prevent use-after-free in encode_cap_msg() 2024-02-23 08:55:09 +01:00
ceph_frag.c License cleanup: add SPDX GPL-2.0 license identifier to files with no license 2017-11-02 11:10:55 +01:00
debugfs.c ceph: add IO size metrics support 2021-06-29 00:15:51 +02:00
dir.c ceph: fix i_nlink underrun during async unlink 2026-04-18 10:33:14 +02:00
export.c ceph: take reference to req->r_parent at point of assignment 2021-06-29 00:15:52 +02:00
file.c ceph: supply snapshot context in ceph_zero_partial_object() 2026-03-04 07:20:35 -05:00
inode.c ceph: fix incorrect revoked caps assert in ceph_fill_file_size() 2023-10-19 23:05:36 +02:00
io.c ceph: fix kerneldoc copypasta over ceph_start_io_direct 2021-04-27 23:52:23 +02:00
io.h ceph: add buffered/direct exclusionary locking for reads and writes 2019-09-16 12:06:25 +02:00
ioctl.c ceph: consider inode's last read/write when calculating wanted caps 2020-03-30 12:42:42 +02:00
ioctl.h License cleanup: add SPDX GPL-2.0 license identifier to files with no license 2017-11-02 11:10:55 +01:00
Kconfig ceph: convert ceph_readpage to netfs_readpage 2021-04-27 23:52:22 +02:00
locks.c ceph: add checking of wait_for_completion_killable() return value 2025-12-07 06:09:25 +09:00
Makefile ceph: add dentry lease metric support 2020-06-01 13:22:51 +02:00
mds_client.c ceph: give up on paths longer than PATH_MAX 2025-01-23 17:15:48 +01:00
mds_client.h ceph: defer stopping mdsc delayed_work 2023-08-11 15:13:56 +02:00
mdsmap.c ceph: fix mdsmap decode when there are MDS's beyond max_mds 2021-11-18 19:17:15 +01:00
metric.c ceph: never send metrics if disable_send_metrics is set 2023-08-03 10:22:46 +02:00
metric.h ceph: add IO size metrics support 2021-06-29 00:15:51 +02:00
quota.c ceph: eliminate ceph_async_iput() 2021-06-29 00:15:52 +02:00
snap.c ceph: fix use-after-free bug for inodes when flushing capsnaps 2023-06-14 11:13:06 +02:00
strings.c ceph: flush mdlog before umounting 2021-09-02 22:49:16 +02:00
super.c ceph: validate snapdirname option length when mounting 2025-01-09 13:28:36 +01:00
super.h ceph: switch to vfs_inode_has_locks() to fix file lock bug 2023-01-12 11:59:14 +01:00
util.c ceph: move net/ceph/ceph_fs.c to fs/ceph/util.c 2020-01-27 16:53:40 +01:00
xattr.c ceph: allow ceph.dir.rctime xattr to be updatable 2022-06-14 18:36:23 +02:00