The Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide (updated for 5.0+ kernels)
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Fix disallowed cr0 write protection and close_fd (#80)
Since the commit 8dbec27a242cd3e2816eeb98d3237b9f57cf6232 [1]
(kernel version v5.3+ [2]) the sensitive CR0 bits in x86 is pinned,
we need to use the inline asm [3][4] to bypass it.

commit 8dbec27a242cd3e2816eeb98d3237b9f57cf6232 :
> With sensitive CR4 bits pinned now, it's possible that the WP bit for
> CR0 might become a target as well.
>
> Following the same reasoning for the CR4 pinning, pin CR0's WP
> bit. Contrary to the cpu feature dependend CR4 pinning this can be done
> with a constant value.

Also, getting "sys_call_table" [8] from the symbol lookup by using the address
of "close_fd" does not work for v5.11+ [5][6]. The reason is the entry of
"sys_call_table[__NR_close]" is not the address of "close_fd", actually
it is "__x64_sys_close" in x86.

Two solutions were proposed: using "kallsyms_lookup_name" [7] or just specifying
the address into the module. The symbol "kallsyms_lookup_name"  is unexported
since v5.7; the address of "sys_call_table" can be found in
"/boot/System.map" or "/proc/kallsyms".

Since v5.7, the manual symbol lookup is not guaranteed to work
because of control-flow integrity (or control-flow enforcement [9][10]) is added
[11] for x86, but it is disabled since v5.11 [12][13]. To make sure manual symbol
lookup work, it only uses up to v5.4.

Reference:
[1] 8dbec27a24
[2] https://outflux.net/blog/archives/2019/11/14/security-things-in-linux-v5-3/
[3] https://patchwork.kernel.org/project/linux-kbuild/patch/20200903203053.3411268-3-samitolvanen@google.com/
[4] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/58512430/how-to-write-to-protected-pages-in-the-linux-kernel
[5] https://lore.kernel.org/bpf/20201120231441.29911-21-ebiederm@xmission.com/
[6] https://lore.kernel.org/bpf/87blj83ysq.fsf@x220.int.ebiederm.org/
[7] 0bd476e6c6
[8] 8f27766a88
[9] https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200204171425.28073-1-yu-cheng.yu@intel.com/
[10] https://lore.kernel.org/linux-doc/20201110162211.9207-1-yu-cheng.yu@intel.com/T/
[11] 5790921bc1
[12] 20bf2b3787
[13] https://lore.kernel.org/bpf/20210128123842.c9e33949e62f504b84bfadf5@gmail.com/
2021-08-31 11:07:01 +08:00
.ci Check coding style in CI 2021-08-17 13:07:06 +08:00
.github/workflows Check coding style in CI 2021-08-17 13:07:06 +08:00
examples Fix disallowed cr0 write protection and close_fd (#80) 2021-08-31 11:07:01 +08:00
lib Introduce \src to generate Linux kernel source hyperlinks 2021-08-09 23:01:34 +08:00
.gitignore Update several example code for newer kernel 2021-08-23 21:30:43 +08:00
GPL-2 Initial import 2021-07-22 06:34:19 +08:00
html.cfg Add PDF download link in html only 2021-08-17 17:35:36 +08:00
LICENSE Initial import 2021-07-22 06:34:19 +08:00
lkmpg.tex Fix disallowed cr0 write protection and close_fd (#80) 2021-08-31 11:07:01 +08:00
Makefile Update several example code for newer kernel 2021-08-23 21:30:43 +08:00
README.md Neither latexmk nor dvipng is required 2021-08-18 20:43:51 +08:00

The Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide

This project keeps the Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide reasonably up to date, with working examples for recent 5.x kernel versions.
The guide has been around since 2001 and most copies of it on the web only describe old 2.6.x kernels.

The book can be freely accessed via https://sysprog21.github.io/lkmpg/ or latest PDF file.
The original guide may be found at Linux Documentation Project.

Getting Started

Compile on Local Machine

To prepare for build this book on your local machine, we're going to install TeXLive (MacTeX). On various Unix/Linux operating systems, this can be done simply by:

# Debian / Ubuntu
$ sudo apt install make texlive-full

# Arch / Manjaro
$ sudo pacman -S make texlive-most texlive-bin

# macOS
$ brew install --cask mactex
$ sudo tlmgr update --self

Now we could build document with following commands:

# download project
$ git clone https://github.com/sysprog21/lkmpg.git && cd lkmpg

# run commands
$ make all              # Generate PDFdocument
$ make html             # Convert TeX to HTML
$ make clean            # Delete generated files

Compile with Docker

The compilation could be completed flawlessly using Docker. **Using Docker is recommended, as it guarantees the same dependencies with our GitHub Actions wokrflow.

After install docker engine on your machine, pulling the docker image twtug/lkmpg and compile with it.

Execute followings

# download project
$ git clone https://github.com/sysprog21/lkmpg.git && cd lkmpg

# pull docker image and run it as container
$ docker pull twtug/lkmpg
$ docker run --rm -it -v $(pwd):/workdir twtug/lkmpg

# run commands
$ make all              # Generate PDF document
$ make html             # Convert TeX to HTML
$ make clean            # Delete generated files

License

The Linux Kernel Module Programming Guide is a free book; you may reproduce and/or modify it under the terms of the Open Software License.
Use of this work is governed by a copyleft license that can be found in the LICENSE file.

The complementary sample code is licensed under GNU GPL version 2, as same as Linux kernel.