From: Alexander Atanasov <alex@zazolabs.com>
To: Shuah Khan <shuah@kernel.org>,
Christian Brauner <brauner@kernel.org>,
Jeff Layton <jlayton@kernel.org>
Cc: Alexander Atanasov <alex@zazolabs.com>,
Guenter Roeck <linux@roeck-us.net>,
Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>,
Alejandro Colomar <alx.manpages@gmail.com>,
Clint George <clintbgeorge@gmail.com>,
Ranganath V N <vnranganath.20@gmail.com>,
linux-kselftest@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: [PATCH] selftests/filesystems: follow std execveat argument convention in anon_inode_no_exec
Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2026 11:10:07 +0000 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260120111008.442109-1-alex@zazolabs.com> (raw)
While compiling filesystem selftests there is a warning:
anon_inode_test.c:45:37: warning: null passed to a callee that
requires a non-null argument [-Wnonnull]
45 | ASSERT_LT(execveat(fd_context, "", NULL, NULL, AT_EMPTY_PATH), 0);
Kernel code is okay to be passed NULL for argv, in which
case it generates argv by itself inside do_execveat_common.
Man page of execvat lists both argv and envp as _Nullable.
But system's unistd.h says different:
extern int execveat (int __fd, const char *__path, char *const __argv[],
char *const __envp[], int __flags)
__THROW __nonnull ((2, 3));
(checked ubuntu 24.04 and fedora 43)
Which is the reason for the compiler warning.
Fix the warning by passing a proper argv array.
Fixes: f8ca403ae77cb ("selftests/filesystems: add exec() test for anonymous inodes")
Cc: Christian Brauner <brauner@kernel.org>
Cc: Guenter Roeck <linux@roeck-us.net>
Cc: Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>
Cc: Alejandro Colomar <alx.manpages@gmail.com>
Cc: Clint George <clintbgeorge@gmail.com>
Cc: Ranganath V N <vnranganath.20@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Alexander Atanasov <alex@zazolabs.com>
---
tools/testing/selftests/filesystems/anon_inode_test.c | 4 +++-
1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
Quote from execv's man referenced from execveat's:
On Linux, argv and envp can be specified as NULL.
In both cases, this has the same effect as specifying the argument as a pointer
to a list containing a single null pointer.
***Do not take advantage of this nonstandard and nonportable misfeature!***
Listed as possible to pass NULL, then a big fat warning in the man page
and a header that acctually marks this as invalid usage.
I failed to find the origin of the above contradiction.
It looks like POSIX/GNU/Linux missalignment.
I am putting this here for the record. So may be someone could step in
and make it right.
I've Cc-ed people who made fixes but they are just compile fixes, no
explanation of why the warning exists and in most of them the array is not a proper
argv.
diff --git a/tools/testing/selftests/filesystems/anon_inode_test.c b/tools/testing/selftests/filesystems/anon_inode_test.c
index 94c6c81c2301..191549a4304d 100644
--- a/tools/testing/selftests/filesystems/anon_inode_test.c
+++ b/tools/testing/selftests/filesystems/anon_inode_test.c
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <stdio.h>
+#include <unistd.h>
#include <sys/stat.h>
#include "kselftest_harness.h"
@@ -37,12 +38,13 @@ TEST(anon_inode_no_chmod)
TEST(anon_inode_no_exec)
{
+ char *const argv[] = { "", NULL };
int fd_context;
fd_context = sys_fsopen("tmpfs", 0);
ASSERT_GE(fd_context, 0);
- ASSERT_LT(execveat(fd_context, "", NULL, NULL, AT_EMPTY_PATH), 0);
+ ASSERT_LT(execveat(fd_context, "", argv, NULL, AT_EMPTY_PATH), 0);
ASSERT_EQ(errno, EACCES);
EXPECT_EQ(close(fd_context), 0);
--
2.43.0
next reply other threads:[~2026-01-20 11:10 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 2+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2026-01-20 11:10 Alexander Atanasov [this message]
2026-01-20 12:43 ` Alejandro Colomar
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