[Bug manual/16402] New: Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[Bug manual/16402] New: Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[mdione at grulic dot org.ar]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

            Bug ID: 16402
           Summary: Missing case in execve(2) manpage
           Product: glibc
           Version: unspecified
            Status: NEW
          Severity: minor
          Priority: P2
         Component: manual
          Assignee: unassigned at sourceware dot org
          Reporter: mdione at grulic dot org.ar
                CC: mtk.manpages at gmail dot com, roland at gnu dot org

The manpage for execve(2) correctly lists EFAULT as a possible error, but seems
to omit the case when it's returned because one of the pointers in the list or
array for argv is invalid. It happened to me that calling execl() with two
literal strings and no NULL terminator returned this error sometimes. Example:

#include <unistd.h>

execl("/bin/ls", "ls");

I know this is minor, but trying to fix the bug in my code I was misguided by
the description in the manpage. It just seemed impossible!

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[Bug manual/16402] Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[siddhesh at redhat dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

Siddhesh Poyarekar <siddhesh at redhat dot com> changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
             Status|NEW                         |RESOLVED
                 CC|                            |siddhesh at redhat dot com
         Resolution|---                         |INVALID

--- Comment #1 from Siddhesh Poyarekar <siddhesh at redhat dot com> ---
The glibc project does not maintain the man pages.  See:

https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/

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[Bug manual/16402] Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[mtk.manpages at gmail dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages at gmail dot com> changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
         Resolution|INVALID                     |DUPLICATE

--- Comment #2 from Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages at gmail dot com> ---
Siddesh, many years ago Roland created bug 1481 for these cases, but I think
everyone forgot about it. I found it kind of useful ;-).

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 1481 ***

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[Bug manual/16402] Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[mtk.manpages at gmail dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

--- Comment #3 from Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages at gmail dot com> ---
(In reply to Marcos Dione from comment #0)
> The manpage for execve(2) correctly lists EFAULT as a possible error, but
> seems to omit the case when it's returned because one of the pointers in the
> list or array for argv is invalid. It happened to me that calling execl()
> with two literal strings and no NULL terminator returned this error
> sometimes. Example:
> 
> #include <unistd.h>
> 
> execl("/bin/ls", "ls");
> 
> I know this is minor, but trying to fix the bug in my code I was misguided
> by the description in the manpage. It just seemed impossible!

I changed the man page text to:

       EFAULT filename  or  one of the pointers in the vectors argv or
              envp points outside your accessible address space.

Thanks for the report.

Cheers,

Michael

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[Bug manual/16402] Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[mdione at grulic dot org.ar]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

--- Comment #4 from Marcos Dione <mdione at grulic dot org.ar> ---
Sorry for the misplaced report. While writing the bug report I saw another bug
report on manpages (#5468), but I never thought the WONTFIX was related to,
well, manpages not being part of glibc. Maybe a warning in the bug report page?
>From the caps in the #1481 I figure you're tired of these kind of bugs. Again,
sorry for the noise.

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[Bug manual/16402] Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[mtk.manpages at gmail dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

--- Comment #5 from Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages at gmail dot com> ---
(In reply to Marcos Dione from comment #4)
> Sorry for the misplaced report. While writing the bug report I saw another
> bug report on manpages (#5468), but I never thought the WONTFIX was related
> to, well, manpages not being part of glibc. Maybe a warning in the bug
> report page? From the caps in the #1481 I figure you're tired of these kind
> of bugs. Again, sorry for the noise.

No problem for me. I don't know how the glibc maintaiuners feel about these
occasional misplaced bug reports, but bug 1481 is at least a way of ensuring
they're channeled in the direction of man-pages, which is good (from my point
of view).

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[Bug manual/16402] Missing case in execve(2) manpage

[fweimer at redhat dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=16402

Florian Weimer <fweimer at redhat dot com> changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Flags|                            |security-

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