From: Jori Koolstra <jkoolstra@xs4all.nl>
To: Jeff Layton <jlayton@kernel.org>,
Christian Brauner <brauner@kernel.org>,
Al Viro <viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk>,
Aleksa Sarai <aleksa@amutable.com>, NeilBrown <neil@brown.name>,
Amir Goldstein <amir73il@gmail.com>, Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz>
Cc: linux-fsdevel@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org,
Jori Koolstra <jkoolstra@xs4all.nl>
Subject: [PATCH v3 12/14] vfs: short-circuit MAY_WRITE access for O_DIRECTORY opens
Date: Sat, 4 Jul 2026 18:41:46 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260704164149.3480051-13-jkoolstra@xs4all.nl> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20260704164149.3480051-1-jkoolstra@xs4all.nl>
Requesting write access on a directory can never succeed. Rather
than performing a path-walk to determine whether the target is
actually a directory (-EISDIR) or not (-ENOTDIR), or does not exist
(-ENOENT), etc., we short-circuit to -ENOTDIR.
Currently O_WRONLY for directories is only blocked in may_open(),
which happens after we have the inode for the target, so after any
create via O_CREAT|O_DIRECTORY.
The advantage of short-circuiting is that we don't have to add even
more logic to lookup_open() to differentiate -EISDIR/-ENOTDIR. Also,
for filesystems that define atomic_open(), handling this cannot even be
done at the VFS level, as we can't know ahead of calling
->atomic_open() what the result of the lookup is.
Suggested-by: Christian Brauner (Amutable) <brauner@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Jori Koolstra <jkoolstra@xs4all.nl>
---
fs/open.c | 11 +++++++++--
1 file changed, 9 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
diff --git a/fs/open.c b/fs/open.c
index 9121aece78bc..87e8864d9480 100644
--- a/fs/open.c
+++ b/fs/open.c
@@ -1270,9 +1270,16 @@ inline int build_open_flags(const struct open_how *how, struct open_flags *op)
op->intent = flags & O_PATH ? 0 : LOOKUP_OPEN;
+ /*
+ * Requesting write access on a directory can never succeed. Rather
+ * than performing a path-walk to determine whether the target is
+ * actually a directory (-EISDIR) or not (-ENOTDIR), we short-circuit
+ * to -ENOTDIR.
+ */
+ if ((flags & O_DIRECTORY) && !(flags & __O_TMPFILE) && (acc_mode & MAY_WRITE))
+ return -ENOTDIR;
+
if (flags & O_CREAT) {
- if ((flags & O_DIRECTORY) && (acc_mode & MAY_WRITE))
- return -EISDIR;
op->intent |= LOOKUP_CREATE;
if (flags & O_EXCL) {
op->intent |= LOOKUP_EXCL;
--
2.55.0
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2026-07-04 16:41 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 62+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2026-07-04 16:41 [PATCH v3 00/14] vfs: add O_CREAT|O_DIRECTORY to open*(2) Jori Koolstra
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 01/14] fs/namei.c: use trailing_slashes() Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 3:56 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-06 7:29 ` David Laight
2026-07-06 20:55 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-07 7:42 ` David Laight
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 02/14] vfs: move create error && negative dentry case in lookup_open() up Jori Koolstra
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 03/14] vfs: prepare vfs_creat|mkdir_no_perm for reuse in lookup_open() Jori Koolstra
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 04/14] vfs: call audit_inode_child() in lookup_open() on failure too Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:33 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-06 21:20 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 23:02 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 05/14] fs/namei.c: update docstring of atomic_open() Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:36 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 06/14] vfs: lookup_open(): move setting FMODE_CREATED down Jori Koolstra
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 07/14] vfs: move ->create check in lookup_open() to before try_break_deleg() Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:37 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 08/14] vfs: lookup_open(): use vfs_create_no_perm() Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:38 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 09/14] vfs: add O_CREAT|O_DIRECTORY to open*(2) Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:46 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-07 8:35 ` Pedro Falcato
2026-07-07 10:04 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-07 13:04 ` Pedro Falcato
2026-07-07 13:30 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-13 9:54 ` Christoph Hellwig
2026-07-13 21:35 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-14 5:10 ` Christoph Hellwig
2026-07-14 10:50 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-14 10:46 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-07 10:06 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-07 13:55 ` Pedro Falcato
2026-07-07 14:18 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-08 15:39 ` Pedro Falcato
2026-07-09 6:24 ` Christoph Hellwig
2026-07-09 10:51 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-09 14:21 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-09 14:34 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-13 9:50 ` Christoph Hellwig
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-10 18:55 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-12 12:39 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 10/14] vfs: move O_IS_MKDIR check from lookup_open() into individual filesystems Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:50 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 11/14] vfs: refuse O_CREAT for directories through a dangling symlink Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:51 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-04 16:41 ` Jori Koolstra [this message]
2026-07-06 5:51 ` [PATCH v3 12/14] vfs: short-circuit MAY_WRITE access for O_DIRECTORY opens NeilBrown
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 13/14] selftest: fix headers in fclog.c Jori Koolstra
2026-07-06 5:57 ` NeilBrown
2026-07-06 21:07 ` Jori Koolstra
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-04 16:41 ` [PATCH v3 14/14] selftest: add tests for open*(O_CREAT|O_DIRECTORY) Jori Koolstra
2026-07-07 10:51 ` Christian Brauner
2026-07-07 10:51 ` [PATCH v3 00/14] vfs: add O_CREAT|O_DIRECTORY to open*(2) Christian Brauner
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