the following patch was just integrated into master: commit 2c88cc0696be2b01ebd4df6f7593d8658c8fe419 Author: Vladimir Serbinenko phcoder@gmail.com Date: Sat Mar 30 12:04:23 2013 +0100
Intel microcode: Return when `microcode_updates` is `NULL`
Add a safety check in function `intel_update_microcode` to return when accidentally `NULL` is passed as `microcode_updates`, which would lead to a null pointer dereference later on.
for (c = microcode_updates; m->hdrver; m = (const struct microcode *)c) {
While at it, use `return NULL` for clarity in function `intel_microcode_find` and include the header file `stddef.h`. for it.
The review of this patch had some more discussion on adding more comments and more detailed error messages. But this should be done in a separate patch.
For clarity here some history, on how this was found and what caused the discussion and confusion.
Originally when Vladimir made this improvement, selecting `CPU_MICROCODE_IN_CBFS` in Kconfig but not having the microcode blob `cpu_microcode_blob.bin` in CBFS resulted in a null pointer dereference later on causing a crash.
for (c = microcode_updates; m->hdrver; m = (const struct microcode *)c) {
Vladimir fixed this by returning if `microcode_updates` is `NULL`, that means no file is found and successfully tested this on his Lenovo X201.
When pushing the patch to Gerrit for review, the code was rewritten though by Aaron in commit »intel microcode: split up microcode loading stages« (98ffb426) [1], which also returns when no file is found. So the other parts of the code were checked and the safety check as described above is added.
[1] http://review.coreboot.org/2778
Change-Id: I6e18fd37256910bf047061e4633a66cf29ad7b69 Signed-off-by: Vladimir Serbinenko phcoder@gmail.com Signed-off-by: Paul Menzel paulepanter@users.sourceforge.net Reviewed-on: http://review.coreboot.org/2990 Reviewed-by: Aaron Durbin adurbin@google.com Tested-by: build bot (Jenkins)
Build-Tested: build bot (Jenkins) at Mon Apr 22 15:45:37 2013, giving +1 See http://review.coreboot.org/2990 for details.
-gerrit