Re: Undefined use of weak symbols in gnulib

[Florian Weimer]

* Bruno Haible:

> Hi Florian,
>
>> Here's a fairly representative test case, I think.
>> 
>> #include <pthread.h>
>> #include <stdio.h>
>> 
>> extern __typeof (pthread_key_create) __pthread_key_create __attribute__ 
>> ((weak));
>> extern __typeof (pthread_once) pthread_once __attribute__ ((weak));
>> 
>> void
>> f1 (void)
>> {
>>   puts ("f1 called");
>> }
>> 
>> pthread_once_t once_var;
>> 
>> void __attribute__ ((weak))
>> f2 (void)
>> {
>>   if (__pthread_key_create != NULL)
>>     pthread_once (&once_var, f1);
>> }
>> 
>> int
>> main (void)
>> {
>>   f2 ();
>> }
>> 
>> Building it with “gcc -O2 -fpie -pie” and linking with binutils 2.30
>> does not result in a crash with LD_PRELOAD=libpthread.so.0.
>
> Thank you for the test case. It helps the understanding.
>
> But I don't understand
>   - why anyone would redeclare 'pthread_once', when it's a standard POSIX
>     function,

I could have used the weak pragma just like gnulib.

>   - why f2 is declared weak,

Oh, sorry for the confusion, it's a quick way to establish a full
compiler barrier with GCC.

>   - why the program skips its initializations in single-threaded mode,

It's a minimal test.

>   - why libpthread would be loaded through LD_PRELOAD or dlopen, given
>     that the long-term statement has been that declaring a symbol weak
>     has no effect on the dynamic linker [1][2][3][4]?

The relevant scenario here is LD_PRELOAD of a library that depends on
libpthread.so.0, so it's about indirect preloading of something that's
more usefull than just libpthread.so.0.  pthread_key_create would still
become available in this case.

>
> How about the following test case instead?
>
> =====================================================================
> #include <pthread.h>
> #include <stdio.h>
>
> #pragma weak pthread_key_create
> #pragma weak pthread_once
>
> void
> do_init (void)
> {
>   puts ("initialization code");
> }
>
> pthread_once_t once_var;
>
> void
> init (void)
> {
>   if (pthread_key_create != NULL)
>     {
>       puts ("multi-threaded initialization");
>       pthread_once (&once_var, do_init);
>     }
>   else
>     do_init ();
> }
>
> int
> main (void)
> {
>   init ();
> }
> =====================================================================
>
> $ gcc -Wall -fpie -pie foo.c ; ./a.out 
> initialization code
>
> $ gcc -Wall -fpie -pie foo.c -Wl,--no-as-needed -lpthread ; ./a.out
> multi-threaded initialization
> initialization code
>
> What will change for this program with glibc 2.34?

If recompiled in this way: The presence of -lpthread will not matter, it
will always behave is if linked with -lpthread.

If not recompiled and linked without -lpthread against glibc 2.33 or
earlier, the behavior with the current glibc 2.34 snapshot is
architecture-dependent and also depends on the binutils version used for
linking the program.  In some cases, calling pthread_once jumps to
address zero (causing a crash), or the call to pthread_once is elided
from the executable.  This scenario can be emulated with older glibc
using LD_PRELOAD=libpthread.so.0.

I will try to come up with a way to preserve the glibc 2.33 behavior for
old binaries.  However, you should really remove those weak symbol
hacks.  They won't have any effect for glibc 2.34, and as explained,
they cause breakage with earlier glibc versions with certain
LD_PRELOAD-ed libraries.

Thanks,
Florian