linux.git/kernel/trace/trace_events.c, branch v6.1.168

tracing: Fix syscall events activation by ensuring refcount hits zero

2026-03-25T10:03:15+00:00

[ Upstream commit 0a663b764dbdf135a126284f454c9f01f95a87d4 ]

When multiple syscall events are specified in the kernel command line
(e.g., trace_event=syscalls:sys_enter_openat,syscalls:sys_enter_close),
they are often not captured after boot, even though they appear enabled
in the tracing/set_event file.

The issue stems from how syscall events are initialized. Syscall
tracepoints require the global reference count (sys_tracepoint_refcount)
to transition from 0 to 1 to trigger the registration of the syscall
work (TIF_SYSCALL_TRACEPOINT) for tasks, including the init process (pid 1).

The current implementation of early_enable_events() with disable_first=true
used an interleaved sequence of "Disable A -> Enable A -> Disable B -> Enable B".
If multiple syscalls are enabled, the refcount never drops to zero,
preventing the 0->1 transition that triggers actual registration.

Fix this by splitting early_enable_events() into two distinct phases:
1. Disable all events specified in the buffer.
2. Enable all events specified in the buffer.

This ensures the refcount hits zero before re-enabling, allowing syscall
events to be properly activated during early boot.

The code is also refactored to use a helper function to avoid logic
duplication between the disable and enable phases.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260224023544.1250787-1-hehuiwen@kylinos.cn
Fixes: ce1039bd3a89 ("tracing: Fix enabling of syscall events on the command line")
Signed-off-by: Huiwen He 
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

tracing: Remove duplicate ENABLE_EVENT_STR and DISABLE_EVENT_STR macros

2026-03-04T12:19:54+00:00

[ Upstream commit 9df0e49c5b9b8d051529be9994e4f92f2d20be6f ]

The macros ENABLE_EVENT_STR and DISABLE_EVENT_STR were added to trace.h so
that more than one file can have access to them, but was never removed
from their original location. Remove the duplicates.

Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Cc: Tom Zanussi 
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260126130037.4ba201f9@gandalf.local.home
Fixes: d0bad49bb0a09 ("tracing: Add enable_hist/disable_hist triggers")
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin

tracing: Do not register unsupported perf events

2026-01-11T14:18:56+00:00

commit ef7f38df890f5dcd2ae62f8dbde191d72f3bebae upstream.

Synthetic events currently do not have a function to register perf events.
This leads to calling the tracepoint register functions with a NULL
function pointer which triggers:

 ------------[ cut here ]------------
 WARNING: kernel/tracepoint.c:175 at tracepoint_add_func+0x357/0x370, CPU#2: perf/2272
 Modules linked in: kvm_intel kvm irqbypass
 CPU: 2 UID: 0 PID: 2272 Comm: perf Not tainted 6.18.0-ftest-11964-ge022764176fc-dirty #323 PREEMPTLAZY
 Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.17.0-debian-1.17.0-1 04/01/2014
 RIP: 0010:tracepoint_add_func+0x357/0x370
 Code: 28 9c e8 4c 0b f5 ff eb 0f 4c 89 f7 48 c7 c6 80 4d 28 9c e8 ab 89 f4 ff 31 c0 5b 41 5c 41 5d 41 5e 41 5f 5d c3 cc cc cc cc cc <0f> 0b 49 c7 c6 ea ff ff ff e9 ee fe ff ff 0f 0b e9 f9 fe ff ff 0f
 RSP: 0018:ffffabc0c44d3c40 EFLAGS: 00010246
 RAX: 0000000000000001 RBX: ffff9380aa9e4060 RCX: 0000000000000000
 RDX: 000000000000000a RSI: ffffffff9e1d4a98 RDI: ffff937fcf5fd6c8
 RBP: 0000000000000001 R08: 0000000000000007 R09: ffff937fcf5fc780
 R10: 0000000000000003 R11: ffffffff9c193910 R12: 000000000000000a
 R13: ffffffff9e1e5888 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: ffffabc0c44d3c78
 FS:  00007f6202f5f340(0000) GS:ffff93819f00f000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
 CS:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
 CR2: 000055d3162281a8 CR3: 0000000106a56003 CR4: 0000000000172ef0
 Call Trace:
  
  tracepoint_probe_register+0x5d/0x90
  synth_event_reg+0x3c/0x60
  perf_trace_event_init+0x204/0x340
  perf_trace_init+0x85/0xd0
  perf_tp_event_init+0x2e/0x50
  perf_try_init_event+0x6f/0x230
  ? perf_event_alloc+0x4bb/0xdc0
  perf_event_alloc+0x65a/0xdc0
  __se_sys_perf_event_open+0x290/0x9f0
  do_syscall_64+0x93/0x7b0
  ? entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e
  ? trace_hardirqs_off+0x53/0xc0
  entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e

Instead, have the code return -ENODEV, which doesn't warn and has perf
error out with:

 # perf record -e synthetic:futex_wait
Error:
The sys_perf_event_open() syscall returned with 19 (No such device) for event (synthetic:futex_wait).
"dmesg | grep -i perf" may provide additional information.

Ideally perf should support synthetic events, but for now just fix the
warning. The support can come later.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Cc: Arnaldo Carvalho de Melo 
Cc: Jiri Olsa 
Cc: Namhyung Kim 
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20251216182440.147e4453@gandalf.local.home
Fixes: 4b147936fa509 ("tracing: Add support for 'synthetic' events")
Reported-by: Ian Rogers 
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

tracing: Add down_write(trace_event_sem) when adding trace event

2025-07-24T06:51:48+00:00

commit b5e8acc14dcb314a9b61ff19dcd9fdd0d88f70df upstream.

When a module is loaded, it adds trace events defined by the module. It
may also need to modify the modules trace printk formats to replace enum
names with their values.

If two modules are loaded at the same time, the adding of the event to the
ftrace_events list can corrupt the walking of the list in the code that is
modifying the printk format strings and crash the kernel.

The addition of the event should take the trace_event_sem for write while
it adds the new event.

Also add a lockdep_assert_held() on that semaphore in
__trace_add_event_dirs() as it iterates the list.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Acked-by: Masami Hiramatsu (Google) 
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20250718223158.799bfc0c@batman.local.home
Reported-by: Fusheng Huang(黄富生)  
Closes: https://lore.kernel.org/all/20250717105007.46ccd18f@batman.local.home/
Fixes: 110bf2b764eb6 ("tracing: add protection around module events unload")
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

tracing: Verify event formats that have "%*p.."

2025-05-02T05:46:49+00:00

[ Upstream commit ea8d7647f9ddf1f81e2027ed305299797299aa03 ]

The trace event verifier checks the formats of trace events to make sure
that they do not point at memory that is not in the trace event itself or
in data that will never be freed. If an event references data that was
allocated when the event triggered and that same data is freed before the
event is read, then the kernel can crash by reading freed memory.

The verifier runs at boot up (or module load) and scans the print formats
of the events and checks their arguments to make sure that dereferenced
pointers are safe. If the format uses "%*p.." the verifier will ignore it,
and that could be dangerous. Cover this case as well.

Also add to the sample code a use case of "%*pbl".

Link: https://lore.kernel.org/all/bcba4d76-2c3f-4d11-baf0-02905db953dd@oracle.com/

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Fixes: 5013f454a352c ("tracing: Add check of trace event print fmts for dereferencing pointers")
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20250327195311.2d89ec66@gandalf.local.home
Reported-by: Libo Chen 
Reviewed-by: Libo Chen 
Tested-by: Libo Chen 
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin

tracing: fix return value in __ftrace_event_enable_disable for TRACE_REG_UNREGISTER

2025-04-25T08:43:31+00:00

[ Upstream commit 0c588ac0ca6c22b774d9ad4a6594681fdfa57d9d ]

When __ftrace_event_enable_disable invokes the class callback to
unregister the event, the return value is not reported up to the
caller, hence leading to event unregister failures being silently
ignored.

This patch assigns the ret variable to the invocation of the
event unregister callback, so that its return value is stored
and reported to the caller, and it raises a warning in case
of error.

Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20250321170821.101403-1-gpaoloni@redhat.com
Signed-off-by: Gabriele Paoloni 
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin

tracing: Have process_string() also allow arrays

2025-01-09T12:29:56+00:00

commit afc6717628f959941d7b33728570568b4af1c4b8 upstream.

In order to catch a common bug where a TRACE_EVENT() TP_fast_assign()
assigns an address of an allocated string to the ring buffer and then
references it in TP_printk(), which can be executed hours later when the
string is free, the function test_event_printk() runs on all events as
they are registered to make sure there's no unwanted dereferencing.

It calls process_string() to handle cases in TP_printk() format that has
"%s". It returns whether or not the string is safe. But it can have some
false positives.

For instance, xe_bo_move() has:

 TP_printk("move_lacks_source:%s, migrate object %p [size %zu] from %s to %s device_id:%s",
            __entry->move_lacks_source ? "yes" : "no", __entry->bo, __entry->size,
            xe_mem_type_to_name[__entry->old_placement],
            xe_mem_type_to_name[__entry->new_placement], __get_str(device_id))

Where the "%s" references into xe_mem_type_to_name[]. This is an array of
pointers that should be safe for the event to access. Instead of flagging
this as a bad reference, if a reference points to an array, where the
record field is the index, consider it safe.

Link: https://lore.kernel.org/all/9dee19b6185d325d0e6fa5f7cbba81d007d99166.camel@sapience.com/

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20241231000646.324fb5f7@gandalf.local.home
Fixes: 65a25d9f7ac02 ("tracing: Add "%s" check in test_event_printk()")
Reported-by: Genes Lists 
Tested-by: Gene C 
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

tracing: Add "%s" check in test_event_printk()

2024-12-27T12:52:59+00:00

commit 65a25d9f7ac02e0cf361356e834d1c71d36acca9 upstream.

The test_event_printk() code makes sure that when a trace event is
registered, any dereferenced pointers in from the event's TP_printk() are
pointing to content in the ring buffer. But currently it does not handle
"%s", as there's cases where the string pointer saved in the ring buffer
points to a static string in the kernel that will never be freed. As that
is a valid case, the pointer needs to be checked at runtime.

Currently the runtime check is done via trace_check_vprintf(), but to not
have to replicate everything in vsnprintf() it does some logic with the
va_list that may not be reliable across architectures. In order to get rid
of that logic, more work in the test_event_printk() needs to be done. Some
of the strings can be validated at this time when it is obvious the string
is valid because the string will be saved in the ring buffer content.

Do all the validation of strings in the ring buffer at boot in
test_event_printk(), and make sure that the field of the strings that
point into the kernel are accessible. This will allow adding checks at
runtime that will validate the fields themselves and not rely on paring
the TP_printk() format at runtime.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mark Rutland 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Cc: Andrew Morton 
Cc: Al Viro 
Cc: Linus Torvalds 
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20241217024720.685917008@goodmis.org
Fixes: 5013f454a352c ("tracing: Add check of trace event print fmts for dereferencing pointers")
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

tracing: Add missing helper functions in event pointer dereference check

2024-12-27T12:52:59+00:00

commit 917110481f6bc1c96b1e54b62bb114137fbc6d17 upstream.

The process_pointer() helper function looks to see if various trace event
macros are used. These macros are for storing data in the event. This
makes it safe to dereference as the dereference will then point into the
event on the ring buffer where the content of the data stays with the
event itself.

A few helper functions were missing. Those were:

  __get_rel_dynamic_array()
  __get_dynamic_array_len()
  __get_rel_dynamic_array_len()
  __get_rel_sockaddr()

Also add a helper function find_print_string() to not need to use a middle
man variable to test if the string exists.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mark Rutland 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Cc: Andrew Morton 
Cc: Al Viro 
Cc: Linus Torvalds 
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20241217024720.521836792@goodmis.org
Fixes: 5013f454a352c ("tracing: Add check of trace event print fmts for dereferencing pointers")
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

tracing: Fix test_event_printk() to process entire print argument

2024-12-27T12:52:59+00:00

commit a6629626c584200daf495cc9a740048b455addcd upstream.

The test_event_printk() analyzes print formats of trace events looking for
cases where it may dereference a pointer that is not in the ring buffer
which can possibly be a bug when the trace event is read from the ring
buffer and the content of that pointer no longer exists.

The function needs to accurately go from one print format argument to the
next. It handles quotes and parenthesis that may be included in an
argument. When it finds the start of the next argument, it uses a simple
"c = strstr(fmt + i, ',')" to find the end of that argument!

In order to include "%s" dereferencing, it needs to process the entire
content of the print format argument and not just the content of the first
',' it finds. As there may be content like:

 ({ const char *saved_ptr = trace_seq_buffer_ptr(p); static const char
   *access_str[] = { "---", "--x", "w--", "w-x", "-u-", "-ux", "wu-", "wux"
   }; union kvm_mmu_page_role role; role.word = REC->role;
   trace_seq_printf(p, "sp gen %u gfn %llx l%u %u-byte q%u%s %s%s" " %snxe
   %sad root %u %s%c", REC->mmu_valid_gen, REC->gfn, role.level,
   role.has_4_byte_gpte ? 4 : 8, role.quadrant, role.direct ? " direct" : "",
   access_str[role.access], role.invalid ? " invalid" : "", role.efer_nx ? ""
   : "!", role.ad_disabled ? "!" : "", REC->root_count, REC->unsync ?
   "unsync" : "sync", 0); saved_ptr; })

Which is an example of a full argument of an existing event. As the code
already handles finding the next print format argument, process the
argument at the end of it and not the start of it. This way it has both
the start of the argument as well as the end of it.

Add a helper function "process_pointer()" that will do the processing during
the loop as well as at the end. It also makes the code cleaner and easier
to read.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Cc: Masami Hiramatsu 
Cc: Mark Rutland 
Cc: Mathieu Desnoyers 
Cc: Andrew Morton 
Cc: Al Viro 
Cc: Linus Torvalds 
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/20241217024720.362271189@goodmis.org
Fixes: 5013f454a352c ("tracing: Add check of trace event print fmts for dereferencing pointers")
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt (Google) 
Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman