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authorLinus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>2026-08-30 09:22:00 -0700
committerLinus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>2026-08-30 09:22:00 -0700
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tree2536f4b2d7893ccd916b5abdf3c454ad6edc03c2 /Documentation/userspace-api/spec_ctrl.rst
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Merge tag 'trace-v7.3-2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/trace/linux-tracegrafted
Pull tracing fixes from Steven Rostedt: - Fix error output of boot instance creation failure Currently if a boot instance creation fails, instead of printing out the name of the instance that failed, it prints "(null)". That is because it prints "cur_str" that had already been processed by strsep(). Print the saved name instead. While at it, print the error code of the failure. - Fix use-after-free for same named historgrams Histograms can be named so that they can be used in multiple events. But if the named histogram has a variable attached, the second event that uses the named histogram which duplicates it and needs to free the original after duplication leaves the old variable in place and still visible. If another histogram uses than variable, it will use the stale one which will try to reference the freed duplicate histogram and crash the kernel. Free the duplicate variables along with the duplicated histogram data. - Check return value of kthread_run() in event self test The events self tests uses a kthread for testing but does not check if it succeeded in creating a kthread. If the kthread creation were to fail, the code will still try to call kthread_stop() on the error returned. - Fix race between reading trace_pipe and updating subbuffer size If a user is reading the trace_pipe file at the same time they update the ring buffer sub-buffer size, can cause the trace_pipe read to read stale data. Add trace_access_lock() around updating the ring buffer sub-buffer size. - Fix eventfs_inode on failure path in creation of the events directory In the creation of the "events" directory, if after allocating the eventfs_inode a failure is detected, it calls cleanup_ei() which calls free_ei(). The free_ei() will test if eventfs_inode being freed has no children. It is a bug if it does. But on the failure case of the creation of the "events" directory, the children lists have not yet been initialized and the free will trigger a warning because list_empty() on an uninitialized list returns false. Move the initialization into init_ei() where it makes more sense and makes sure that a created eventfs_inode has its lists initialized upon creation. - Check return value of kthread_run() in ftrace direct sample code The sample code that shows how to use the ftrace direct calls does not test the return of kthread_run() to see if it succeeds. Return a failure if the kthread_run() doesn't succeed. - Clear user events state on fork in case of alloc failure On fork, the child gets a pointer to the parent's user events state. It makes a copy of it then updates the child's pointer to it. But if the allocation fails, the duplication function leaves the child with a pointer to its parent's descriptor. When the child cleans up its data, it will free the parent's descriptor while the parent is still using it. In the duplication function, set the child's user_event_mm to NULL before testing if the allocation succeeded, and when it exits it will not free the parent's descriptor. - Fix retry exhaustion in simple ring buffer reader swap simple_ring_buffer_swap_reader_page() starts with retry set to 8 and post-decrements it only after a failed link replacement. On the final attempt, a successful replacement leaves retry at zero, while a failed replacement leaves it at -1. But the check for success expects the retry value to be non-zero and exits with an error on zero. This is the opposite result. Fix it. - Fail nicely when the remote swap_reader_page() returns an error Currently, if the swap_reader_page() of a remote buffer fails, it triggers a WARN_ON_ONCE() and continues normally. Instead, have it exit with an error and a pr_warn() print instead of a full WARNING. * tag 'trace-v7.3-2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/trace/linux-trace: ring-buffer: Stop remote reader update when page swap fails tracing: Fix retry exhaustion in simple ring buffer reader swap tracing/user_events: Clear copied tracing state before fork duplication samples/ftrace: Fix kthread_stop() on ERR_PTR in ftrace-direct-multi-modify samples/ftrace: Fix kthread_stop() on ERR_PTR in ftrace-direct-modify eventfs: Initialize ei->children and ei->list in init_ei() tracing: Fix use-after-free in trace_pipe read on sub-buffer order change tracing: Fix crash passing ERR_PTR to kthread_stop() tracing: Fix use-after-free with same-name named triggers tracing: Fix logged instance name on creation failure
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+===================
+Speculation Control
+===================
+
+Quite some CPUs have speculation-related misfeatures which are in
+fact vulnerabilities causing data leaks in various forms even across
+privilege domains.
+
+The kernel provides mitigation for such vulnerabilities in various
+forms. Some of these mitigations are compile-time configurable and some
+can be supplied on the kernel command line.
+
+There is also a class of mitigations which are very expensive, but they can
+be restricted to a certain set of processes or tasks in controlled
+environments. The mechanism to control these mitigations is via
+:manpage:`prctl(2)`.
+
+There are two prctl options which are related to this:
+
+ * PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL
+
+ * PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL
+
+PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL
+-----------------------
+
+PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL returns the state of the speculation misfeature
+which is selected with arg2 of prctl(2). The return value uses bits 0-3 with
+the following meaning (with the caveat that PR_SPEC_L1D_FLUSH has less obvious
+semantics, see documentation for that specific control below):
+
+==== ====================== ==================================================
+Bit Define Description
+==== ====================== ==================================================
+0 PR_SPEC_PRCTL Mitigation can be controlled per task by
+ PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL.
+1 PR_SPEC_ENABLE The speculation feature is enabled, mitigation is
+ disabled.
+2 PR_SPEC_DISABLE The speculation feature is disabled, mitigation is
+ enabled.
+3 PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE Same as PR_SPEC_DISABLE, but cannot be undone. A
+ subsequent prctl(..., PR_SPEC_ENABLE) will fail.
+4 PR_SPEC_DISABLE_NOEXEC Same as PR_SPEC_DISABLE, but the state will be
+ cleared on :manpage:`execve(2)`.
+==== ====================== ==================================================
+
+If all bits are 0 the CPU is not affected by the speculation misfeature.
+
+If PR_SPEC_PRCTL is set, then the per-task control of the mitigation is
+available. If not set, prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL) for the speculation
+misfeature will fail.
+
+.. _set_spec_ctrl:
+
+PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL
+-----------------------
+
+PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL allows to control the speculation misfeature, which
+is selected by arg2 of :manpage:`prctl(2)` per task. arg3 is used to hand
+in the control value, i.e. either PR_SPEC_ENABLE or PR_SPEC_DISABLE or
+PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE.
+
+Common error codes
+------------------
+======= =================================================================
+Value Meaning
+======= =================================================================
+EINVAL The prctl is not implemented by the architecture or unused
+ prctl(2) arguments are not 0.
+
+ENODEV arg2 is selecting a not supported speculation misfeature.
+======= =================================================================
+
+PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL error codes
+-----------------------------------
+======= =================================================================
+Value Meaning
+======= =================================================================
+0 Success
+
+ERANGE arg3 is incorrect, i.e. it's neither PR_SPEC_ENABLE nor
+ PR_SPEC_DISABLE nor PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE.
+
+ENXIO For PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS: control of the selected speculation misfeature
+ is not possible via prctl, because of the system's boot configuration.
+
+EPERM Speculation was disabled with PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE and caller tried to
+ enable it again.
+
+EPERM For PR_SPEC_L1D_FLUSH and PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH: control of the
+ mitigation is not possible because of the system's boot configuration.
+
+======= =================================================================
+
+Speculation misfeature controls
+-------------------------------
+- PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS: Speculative Store Bypass
+
+ Invocations:
+ * prctl(PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, 0, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_ENABLE, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_DISABLE, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_DISABLE_NOEXEC, 0, 0);
+
+- PR_SPEC_INDIR_BRANCH: Indirect Branch Speculation in User Processes
+ (Mitigate Spectre V2 style attacks against user processes)
+
+ Invocations:
+ * prctl(PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, 0, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, PR_SPEC_ENABLE, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, PR_SPEC_DISABLE, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE, 0, 0);
+
+- PR_SPEC_L1D_FLUSH: Flush L1D Cache on context switch out of the task
+ (works only when tasks run on non SMT cores)
+
+For this control, PR_SPEC_ENABLE means that the **mitigation** is enabled (L1D
+is flushed), PR_SPEC_DISABLE means it is disabled.
+
+ Invocations:
+ * prctl(PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_L1D_FLUSH, 0, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_L1D_FLUSH, PR_SPEC_ENABLE, 0, 0);
+ * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_L1D_FLUSH, PR_SPEC_DISABLE, 0, 0);