Re: Cannot partition 32GB disk on a 32bit machine (correct version of the patch this time)

From: Cox, Alan
Date: Thu Jun 19 2014 - 05:33:35 EST


On Thu, 2014-06-19 at 10:30 +0100, Alan Cox wrote:
> The block code has 32bit cleanness problems with the iterator. This
> prevents things like partitioning a 32GB volume on a 32bit system.
>
> I hit this with a volume of exactly 32GB in size (easy to duplicate with
> virtual machines). Tracing at step by step through the kernel I found
> the problem lines in blkdev_read_iter which truncates the size value
> into a 32bit value when setting up the iterator.
>
> The hack below if applied "fixes" this and I think demonstrates that
> this is the problem spot.
>
> What I'm less clear on is what the correct fix for this should be.

block: fix inability to partition large volumes

From: Alan <alan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

The block code has 32bit cleanness problems with the iterator. This
prevents things like partitioning a 32GB volume on a 32bit system.

This is a simple initial "fix" that clips the problem cases so get
behaviour that is at least sane and trivially backportable.

Signed-off-by: Alan Cox <alan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
---
fs/block_dev.c | 3 +++
1 file changed, 3 insertions(+)

diff --git a/fs/block_dev.c b/fs/block_dev.c
index 6d72746..bef2414 100644
--- a/fs/block_dev.c
+++ b/fs/block_dev.c
@@ -1603,6 +1603,9 @@ static ssize_t blkdev_read_iter(struct kiocb
*iocb, struct iov_iter *to)

size -= pos;
iov_iter_truncate(to, size);
+ /* Fix up for 32bit boxes for now */
+ if (to->count < size)
+ to->count = 0xFFFFFFFF;
return generic_file_read_iter(iocb, to);
}


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