From: Sandeep Dhavale <dhavale@google.com>
To: "Theodore Ts'o" <tytso@mit.edu>
Cc: kernel-team@android.com, Sandeep Dhavale <dhavale@google.com>,
stable@vger.kernel.org,
Andreas Dilger <adilger.kernel@dilger.ca>,
Baokun Li <libaokun@linux.alibaba.com>, Jan Kara <jack@suse.cz>,
Ojaswin Mujoo <ojaswin@linux.ibm.com>,
"Ritesh Harjani (IBM)" <ritesh.list@gmail.com>,
Zhang Yi <yi.zhang@huawei.com>,
linux-ext4@vger.kernel.org, linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
Subject: [PATCH] ext4: fix race between inline dir conversion and folio read
Date: Thu, 17 Sep 2026 19:54:15 -0700 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260918025416.604297-1-dhavale@google.com> (raw)
Commit 90f097b1403f ("ext4: refactor the inline directory conversion and
new directory codepaths") moved directory block initialization in
ext4_convert_inline_data_nolock() into ext4_init_dirblock(), unlocking
data_bh before setting BH_Uptodate.
When block size is smaller than PAGE_SIZE, multiple buffer heads share a
single block device folio. If a concurrent read on that folio runs via
block_read_full_folio() while data_bh is unlocked and not uptodate, it
locks data_bh and submits a disk read for the uninitialized block.
Because ext4_init_dirblock() initializes bh->b_data without holding the
buffer lock, the disk read races with and overwrites the initialized
directory entries and checksum tail, corrupting the directory block:
EXT4-fs warning: ext4_dirblock_csum_verify:375: inode #...:
No space for directory leaf checksum. Please run e2fsck -D.
EXT4-fs error: __ext4_find_entry:1626: inode #...:
checksumming directory block 0
To fix this, mark data_bh uptodate before unlocking it in
ext4_convert_inline_data_nolock(), just like the regular file path
does. Additionally, hold lock_buffer(bh) in ext4_init_dirblock() while
populating the directory entries and checksum tail so any buffer
modifications are properly serialized.
Fixes: 90f097b1403f ("ext4: refactor the inline directory conversion and new directory codepaths")
Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Assisted-by: Antigravity:gemini-3.8-flash
Signed-off-by: Sandeep Dhavale <dhavale@google.com>
---
Note:
This issue was reported by an Android partner encountering kernel panics
in ext4_dirblock_csum_verify() ("No space for directory leaf checksum")
on 16KB page size kernels mounting a 4KB block size ext4 filesystem.
We verified with a standalone reproducer that the race reproduces
deterministically on Iteration 0 (< 1s) on both ARM64 (16KB page size,
4KB ext4 blocks) and upstream ext4-tree/dev on x86_64 (4KB page size,
1KB ext4 blocks), and confirmed that this patch resolves the issue.
fs/ext4/inline.c | 1 +
fs/ext4/namei.c | 2 ++
2 files changed, 3 insertions(+)
diff --git a/fs/ext4/inline.c b/fs/ext4/inline.c
index ceee69a66482..0aa14cee3310 100644
--- a/fs/ext4/inline.c
+++ b/fs/ext4/inline.c
@@ -1167,6 +1167,7 @@ static int ext4_convert_inline_data_nolock(handle_t *handle,
error = ext4_handle_dirty_metadata(handle,
inode, data_bh);
} else {
+ set_buffer_uptodate(data_bh);
unlock_buffer(data_bh);
inode->i_size = inode->i_sb->s_blocksize;
i_size_write(inode, inode->i_sb->s_blocksize);
diff --git a/fs/ext4/namei.c b/fs/ext4/namei.c
index 3b9740c1c16d..6550102fb56b 100644
--- a/fs/ext4/namei.c
+++ b/fs/ext4/namei.c
@@ -2933,6 +2933,7 @@ int ext4_init_dirblock(handle_t *handle, struct inode *inode,
if (ext4_has_feature_metadata_csum(inode->i_sb))
csum_size = sizeof(struct ext4_dir_entry_tail);
+ lock_buffer(bh);
de->inode = cpu_to_le32(inode->i_ino);
de->name_len = 1;
de->rec_len = ext4_rec_len_to_disk(ext4_dir_rec_len(de->name_len, NULL),
@@ -2965,6 +2966,7 @@ int ext4_init_dirblock(handle_t *handle, struct inode *inode,
BUFFER_TRACE(dir_block, "call ext4_handle_dirty_metadata");
set_buffer_uptodate(bh);
set_buffer_verified(bh);
+ unlock_buffer(bh);
return ext4_handle_dirty_dirblock(handle, inode, bh);
}
--
2.55.0.1082.g2b9226bbc0-goog
reply other threads:[~2026-09-18 2:54 UTC|newest]
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