Comment 1 for bug 2009595

Revision history for this message
Mauricio Faria de Oliveira (mfo) wrote :

This is apparently a regression due to (ubuntu-only) kernel commit [1]
commit e9ec6b526c6a ("UBUNTU: SAUCE: (no-up) version: Implement version_signature proc file.")

It modifies the contents of `/proc/version` by appending a version signature
(available individually in `/proc/version_signature`, a new file in `/proc`),
which comes from the `linux_proc_banner` variable/format string.

However, it doesn't modify a related string in the `vmlinux` object file,
which comes from `linux_banner` (no `proc`); i.e., it's without signature.
(This might be on purpose.)

The crash utility, in live system form (without a core dump/memory image),
searches for the contents of `/proc/version` _within_ the output of the
`strings vmlinux` command, to check that `vmlinux` and running system match.
(See source in `crash/filesys.c:match_proc_version() -> match_file_string()`).

The issue then happens because the appended version signature cannot be
found within `vmlinux` (`linux_proc_banner` no longer matches `linux_banner`).

[1] https://git.launchpad.net/~ubuntu-kernel/ubuntu/+source/linux/+git/lunar/commit/?id=e9ec6b526c6ac1f4392430e008d9ff6c3c9eeee1