Linus Torvalds writes: (Summary) As Al
points out, it can cause absolutely horrendous cache access pattern
changes, but it might also be triggering some corruption in case
there's a problem with the plugin, or with some piece of kernel code
that gets confused by it.
that gets confused by it.
And most obviously: if there is some module or part of the kernel that got compiled with a different seed for the randstruct hashing, that will break in nasty nasty ways. We've hit gcc bugs many times before - and the plugins are just new opportunities to hit cases that have gotten a lot less testing than the "normal" code flow has.
the "normal" code flow has.
The structleak plugin is much less likely to be a problem (simply because it's a much simpler plugin), but hey, something being NULL when it shouldn't possibly be might be a stray "leak initialization".
that gets confused by it.
And most obviously: if there is some module or part of the kernel that got compiled with a different seed for the randstruct hashing, that will break in nasty nasty ways. We've hit gcc bugs many times before - and the plugins are just new opportunities to hit cases that have gotten a lot less testing than the "normal" code flow has.
the "normal" code flow has.
The structleak plugin is much less likely to be a problem (simply because it's a much simpler plugin), but hey, something being NULL when it shouldn't possibly be might be a stray "leak initialization".