Re: [RFC/RFT] CFI: Add support for gcc CFI in aarch64

From: Peter Zijlstra
Date: Mon Dec 19 2022 - 10:06:05 EST


On Mon, Dec 19, 2022 at 05:32:04AM -0800, Dan Li wrote:
> Hi Peter,
>
> On 12/19, Peter Zijlstra wrote:
> > On Sun, Dec 18, 2022 at 10:17:58PM -0800, Dan Li wrote:
> >
> > > 1. When a typeid mismatch is detected, the cfi_check_failed function
> > > will be called instead of the brk instruction. This function needs
> > > to be implemented by the compiler user.
> > > If there are user mode programs or other systems that want to use
> > > this feature, it may be more convenient to use a callback (so this
> > > compilation option is set to -fsanitize=cfi instead of kcfi).
> >
> > This is not going to be acceptible for x86_64.
>
> I'm not familiar enough with the x86_64 platform, could you please
> tell me why this is not acceptable? Is there a similar situation
> on the arm64 platform?

Mostly because the call would be a 5 byte instruction while the trap
(UD2) is only 2 bytes.

I suspect Argh64 has a similar problem if the to be called function is
outside the immediate range (26 bits or thereabout), in which case you
end up with a multi-instruction sequence to construct the call target or
so. A trap is always a single instruction.