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Date:      Tue, 13 Mar 2018 18:31:41 -0400
From:      Mark Saad <nonesuch@longcount.org>
To:        "freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org" <freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org>
Cc:        Kristoffer Eriksson <ske@pkmab.se>, Theron <theron.tarigo@gmail.com>, Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com>
Subject:   Re: GSoC Idea: per-process filesystem namespaces for FreeBSD
Message-ID:  <BACCA158-AB12-4DE1-B70A-2084FF2C5806@longcount.org>
In-Reply-To: <CANCZdfoU1B4228RpwfupvdVN9RPCCug4p283xmkNwW7t-M9CjA@mail.gmail.com>
References:  <d7621074-acb4-c5b6-1efd-dc55b51586b1@gmail.com> <201803132055.aa28780@berenice.pkmab.se> <CANCZdfoU1B4228RpwfupvdVN9RPCCug4p283xmkNwW7t-M9CjA@mail.gmail.com>

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> On Mar 13, 2018, at 5:43 PM, Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com> wrote:
>=20
>> On Tue, Mar 13, 2018 at 1:55 PM, Kristoffer Eriksson <ske@pkmab.se> wrote=
:
>>=20
>>=20
>>> On 13 Mar 2018 12:53:18, Theron <theron.tarigo@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> For those unfamiliar with Plan9, here is a rough explanation of the
>>> namespace feature: unlike in Unix, where all processes share the same
>>> virtual filesystem, each process instead has its own view of the
>>> filesystem according to what has been mounted ...
>>=20
>> What if I mount a new /etc with a passwd file where root has no
>> password, and then run "su"?
>>=20
>> (How does Plan9 handle that?)
>>=20
>=20
> Plan9 handles that by having a daemon that does user authentication. It's
> actually more complicated than that, but the machine owner has control ove=
r
> who can do what. For this to work in FreeBSD, either we'd need to disallow=

> the 'file' type for passwd, or we'd have to do something sensible with
> setuid programs. Well, maybe not 'or' but 'and' since the security of
> setuid programs depends on the security of the filesystem.... Plan 9
> doesn't have these complications, so it can offer a user malleable
> filesystem without security risk.
>=20
> Warner

 A kind of related task; FreeBSD could benefit from : Fixing  and improving u=
nionfs / nullfs. There are some weird issues with the current unionfs and wh=
ile it works in many cases there are some edge cases where the comments are s=
omething like =E2=80=9C FreeBSD needs a proper stacking vfs ...=E2=80=9D   t=
he examples I can think of ; imagine you have a jail , chroot or even a Pxe b=
ooted system where you want a a read only null mount from the hosts /bin to t=
he targets /bin . Now expand that to most of the base system and the mount t=
mpfs=E2=80=99s for /tep /var/log etc.  most of that works but try to unmount=
 it in the wrong order or thrash a unionfs with lots of writes ,on top of a t=
mpfs and things break .=20
So to be clear the project would be to better document the various uses of u=
nionfs and nullfs that work , for the ones that do not diving into the stack=
ing vfs and seeing if it could be implemented and if it would help .=20

Alternatively making FreeBSD multiboot compliant would rock . This would all=
ow FreeBSD to natively boot from ipxe or syslinux derivates; thus allowing y=
ou to boot a working FreeBSD install via a kernel and mfsroot image off a we=
b server .

 http://netbsd.gw.com/cgi-bin/man-cgi?multiboot+8+NetBSD-current
http://ipxe.org/


---
Mark Saad | nonesuch@longcount.org

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