printk: add kernel parameter to control writes to /dev/kmsg

Add a "printk.devkmsg" kernel command line parameter which controls how
userspace writes into /dev/kmsg.  It has three options:

 * ratelimit - ratelimit logging from userspace.
 * on  - unlimited logging from userspace
 * off - logging from userspace gets ignored

The default setting is to ratelimit the messages written to it.

This changes the kernel default setting of "on" to "ratelimit" and we do
that because we want to keep userspace spamming /dev/kmsg to sane
levels.  This is especially moot when a small kernel log buffer wraps
around and messages get lost.  So the ratelimiting setting should be a
sane setting where kernel messages should have a bit higher chance of
survival from all the spamming.

It additionally does not limit logging to /dev/kmsg while the system is
booting if we haven't disabled it on the command line.

Furthermore, we can control the logging from a lower priority sysctl
interface - kernel.printk_devkmsg.

That interface will succeed only if printk.devkmsg *hasn't* been
supplied on the command line.  If it has, then printk.devkmsg is a
one-time setting which remains for the duration of the system lifetime.
This "locking" of the setting is to prevent userspace from changing the
logging on us through sysctl(2).

This patch is based on previous patches from Linus and Steven.

[bp@suse.de: fixes]
  Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20160719072344.GC25563@nazgul.tnic
Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20160716061745.15795-3-bp@alien8.de
Signed-off-by: Borislav Petkov <bp@suse.de>
Cc: Dave Young <dyoung@redhat.com>
Cc: Franck Bui <fbui@suse.com>
Cc: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>
Cc: Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org>
Cc: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
Cc: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org>
Cc: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>
Cc: Uwe Kleine-König <u.kleine-koenig@pengutronix.de>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>

2 files changed, 21 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt b/Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt
index e24aa11e8f8a..b240540e49f2 100644
--- a/Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt
+++ b/Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt
@@ -3173,6 +3173,13 @@ bytes respectively. Such letter suffixes can also be entirely omitted.
 			Format: <bool>  (1/Y/y=enable, 0/N/n=disable)
 			default: disabled
 
+	printk.devkmsg={on,off,ratelimit}
+			Control writing to /dev/kmsg.
+			on - unlimited logging to /dev/kmsg from userspace
+			off - logging to /dev/kmsg disabled
+			ratelimit - ratelimit the logging
+			Default: ratelimit
+
 	printk.time=	Show timing data prefixed to each printk message line
 			Format: <bool>  (1/Y/y=enable, 0/N/n=disable)
 
diff --git a/Documentation/sysctl/kernel.txt b/Documentation/sysctl/kernel.txt
index 33204604de6c..ffab8b5caa60 100644
--- a/Documentation/sysctl/kernel.txt
+++ b/Documentation/sysctl/kernel.txt
@@ -764,6 +764,20 @@ send before ratelimiting kicks in.
 
 ==============================================================
 
+printk_devkmsg:
+
+Control the logging to /dev/kmsg from userspace:
+
+ratelimit: default, ratelimited
+on: unlimited logging to /dev/kmsg from userspace
+off: logging to /dev/kmsg disabled
+
+The kernel command line parameter printk.devkmsg= overrides this and is
+a one-time setting until next reboot: once set, it cannot be changed by
+this sysctl interface anymore.
+
+==============================================================
+
 randomize_va_space:
 
 This option can be used to select the type of process address