summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
path: root/scripts/bpf_doc.py
diff options
context:
space:
mode:
authorPaul Moore <paul@paul-moore.com>2025-04-10 15:20:32 -0400
committerPaul Moore <paul@paul-moore.com>2025-04-11 16:41:31 -0400
commit5d7ddc59b3d89b724a5aa8f30d0db94ff8d2d93f (patch)
tree1d6c3754dea88e2e4a920be79b0963fde398368a /scripts/bpf_doc.py
parent8716451a4e57cc82f3656d7a71b67d3b5831ef3f (diff)
selinux: reduce path walk overhead
Reduce the SELinux performance overhead during path walks through the use of a per-task directory access cache and some minor code optimizations. The directory access cache is per-task because it allows for a lockless cache while also fitting well with a common application pattern of heavily accessing a relatively small number of SELinux directory labels. The cache is inherited by child processes when the child runs with the same SELinux domain as the parent, and invalidated on changes to the task's SELinux domain or the loaded SELinux policy. A cache of four entries was chosen based on testing with the Fedora "targeted" policy, a SELinux Reference Policy variant, and 'make allmodconfig' on Linux v6.14. Code optimizations include better use of inline functions to reduce function calls in the common case, especially in the inode revalidation code paths, and elimination of redundant checks between the LSM and SELinux layers. As mentioned briefly above, aside from general use and regression testing with the selinux-testsuite, performance was measured using 'make allmodconfig' with Linux v6.14 as a base reference. As expected, there were variations from one test run to another, but the measurements below are a good representation of the test results seen on my test system. * Linux v6.14 REF 1.26% [k] __d_lookup_rcu SELINUX (1.31%) 0.58% [k] selinux_inode_permission 0.29% [k] avc_lookup 0.25% [k] avc_has_perm_noaudit 0.19% [k] __inode_security_revalidate * Linux v6.14 + patch REF 1.41% [k] __d_lookup_rcu SELINUX (0.89%) 0.65% [k] selinux_inode_permission 0.15% [k] avc_lookup 0.05% [k] avc_has_perm_noaudit 0.04% [k] avc_policy_seqno X.XX% [k] __inode_security_revalidate (now inline) In both cases the __d_lookup_rcu() function was used as a reference point to establish a context for the SELinux related functions. On a unpatched Linux v6.14 system we see the time spent in the combined SELinux functions exceeded that of __d_lookup_rcu(), 1.31% compared to 1.26%. However, with this patch applied the time spent in the combined SELinux functions dropped to roughly 65% of the time spent in __d_lookup_rcu(), 0.89% compared to 1.41%. Aside from the significant decrease in time spent in the SELinux AVC, it appears that any additional time spent searching and updating the cache is offset by other code improvements, e.g. time spent in selinux_inode_permission() + __inode_security_revalidate() + avc_policy_seqno() is less on the patched kernel than the unpatched kernel. It is worth noting that in this patch the use of the per-task cache is limited to the security_inode_permission() LSM callback, selinux_inode_permission(), but future work could expand the cache into inode_has_perm(), likely through consolidation of the two functions. While this would likely have little to no impact on path walks, it may benefit other operations. Reviewed-by: Stephen Smalley <stephen.smalley.work@gmail.com> Tested-by: Stephen Smalley <stephen.smalley.work@gmail.com> Signed-off-by: Paul Moore <paul@paul-moore.com>
Diffstat (limited to 'scripts/bpf_doc.py')
0 files changed, 0 insertions, 0 deletions