[PATCH 0/2] RFC: Adjust powerpc ASLR elf randomness

[Bhupesh Sharma]

Hi Kees,

Thanks for the review.
Please see my comments inline.

On Thu, Feb 2, 2017 at 7:51 PM, Kees Cook <keescook at chromium.org> wrote:
> On Wed, Feb 1, 2017 at 9:42 PM, Bhupesh Sharma <bhsharma at redhat.com> wrote:
>> This RFC patchset tries to make the powerpc ASLR elf randomness
>> implementation similar to other ARCHs (like x86).
>>
>> The 1st patch introduces the support of ARCH_MMAP_RND_BITS in powerpc
>> mmap implementation to allow a sane balance between increased randomness
>> in the mmap address of ASLR elfs and increased address space
>> fragmentation.
>>
>> The 2nd patch increases the ELF_ET_DYN_BASE value from the current
>> hardcoded value of 0x2000_0000 to something more practical,
>> i.e. TASK_SIZE - PAGE_SHIFT (which makes sense especially for
>> 64-bit platforms which would like to utilize more randomization
>> in the load address of a PIE elf).
>
> I don't think you want this second patch. Moving ELF_ET_DYN_BASE to
> the top of TASK_SIZE means you'll be constantly colliding with stack
> and mmap randomization. 0x20000000 is way better since it randomizes
> up from there towards the mmap area.
>
> Is there a reason to avoid the 32-bit memory range for the ELF addresses?
>
> -Kees

I think you are right. Hmm, I think I was going by my particular use
case which might not be required for generic PPC platforms.

I have one doubt though - I have primarily worked on arm64 and x86
architectures and there I see there 64-bit user space applications
using the 64-bit load addresses/ranges. I am not sure why PPC64 is
different historically.

Regards,
Bhupesh