[Crash-utility] [ANNOUNCE] crash version 7.1.7 is available

[Dave Anderson]

Download from: http://people.redhat.com/anderson
                 or
               https://github.com/crash-utility/crash/releases

The github master branch serves as a development branch that will contain 
all patches that are queued for the next release:

  $ git clone git://github.com/crash-utility/crash.git


Changelog:
  
 - Set the default 32-bit MIPS HZ value to 100 if the in-kernel config 
   data is unavailable, and have the "mach" command display the value.
   (rabinv at axis.com)

 - Enable SPARSEMEM support on 32-bit MIPS by setting SECTION_SIZE_BITS
   and MAX_PHYSMEM_BITS.
   (rabinv at axis.com)

 - Fix for Linux 4.9-rc1 commits 15f4eae70d365bba26854c90b6002aaabb18c8aa 
   and c65eacbe290b8141554c71b2c94489e73ade8c8d, which have introduced a
   new CONFIG_THREAD_INFO_IN_TASK configuration.  This configuration
   moves each task's thread_info structure from the base of its kernel 
   stack into its task_struct.  Without the patch, the crash session 
   fails during initialization with the error "crash: invalid structure
   member offset: thread_info_cpu".
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Fixes for the gathering of the active task registers from 32-bit MIPS
   dumpfiles:
    (1) If ELF notes are not available, read them from the kernel's
        crash_notes.
    (2) If an online CPUs did not save its ELF notes, then adjust
        the mapping of each ELF note to its CPU accordingly.
   (rabinv at axis.com)

 - Add support for "help -r" on 32-bit MIPS to display the registers
   for each CPU from a dumpfile.  
   (rabinv at axis.com)

 - Fix for Linux 4.9-rc1 commit 0100301bfdf56a2a370c7157b5ab0fbf9313e1cd,
   which rewrote the x86_64 switch_to() code by embedding the call to
   __switch_to() inside a new __switch_to_asm() assembly code ENTRY()
   function.  Without the patch, the message "crash: cannot determine 
   thread return address" gets displayed during initialization, and the
   "bt" command shows frame #0 starting at "schedule" instead of 
   "__schedule". 
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - When each x86_64 per-cpu cpu_tss.x86_tss.ist[] array member (or in 
   older kernels, each per-cpu init_tss.x86_hw_tss.ist[] array member), 
   is compared with its associated per-cpu orig_ist.ist[] array member,
   ensure that both exception stack pointers have been initialized 
   (non-NULL) before printing a WARNING message if they don't match.
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Fix for a possible segmentation violation when analyzing Linux 4.7 
   x86_64 kernels that are configured with CONFIG_RANDOMIZE_BASE.  
   Depending upon the randomized starting address of the kernel text
   and static data, a segmentation violation may occur during session
   initialization, just after the patching of the gdb minimal_symbol 
   values message.
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Restore the x86_64 "dis" command's symbolic translation of jump
   or call target addresses if the kernel was configured with
   CONFIG_RANDOMIZE_BASE.
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Fix for the 32-bit MIPS "bt" command to prevent an empty display
   (task header only) for an active task if the epc register in its
   exception frame contains 00000000.
   (rabinv at axis.com)

 - Fix for support of Linux 4.7 and later x86_64 ELF kdump vmcores from 
   kernels configured with CONFIG_RANDOMIZE_BASE.  Without the patch,
   the crash session may fail during initialization with the message 
   "crash: vmlinux and vmcore do not match!".
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Fix for the x86_64 "mach" command display of the vmemmap base address
   in Linux 4.9 and later kernels configured with CONFIG_RANDOMIZE_BASE.
   Without the patch, the command shows a value of ffffea0000000000 next
   to "KERNEL VMEMMAP BASE".
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Since the Linux 3.10 release, the kernel has offered the ability to 
   create multiple independent ftrace buffers.  At present, however, 
   the "trace.c" extension module is only able to extract the primary 
   buffer.  This patch refactors the trace.c extension module so that
   the global instance is passed around as a parameter rather than 
   accessing it directly, and then locates all of the available 
   instances and extracts the data from each of them.
   (kyle.a.tomsic at gmail.com)

 - Fix for the s390x "bt" command for active tasks.  Since the commit
   above in this crash-7.1.7 release that added support for the new
   CONFIG_THREAD_INFO_IN_TASK configuration, the backtrace of active
   tasks can be incomplete.
   (holzheu at linux.vnet.ibm.com)

 - In collaboration with an update to the /dev/crash kernel driver, fix
   for Linux 4.6 commit a7f8de168ace487fa7b88cb154e413cf40e87fc6, which
   allows the ARM64 kernel image to be loaded anywhere in physical
   memory.  Without the patch, attempting to run live on an ARM64
   Linux 4.6 and later kernel may display the warning message "WARNING:
   cannot read linux_banner string", and then fails with the message
   "crash: vmlinux and /dev/crash do not match!".  Version 1.3 of the
   crash driver is required, which introduces a new ioctl command that
   retrieves the ARM64-only "kimage_voffset" value that is required for
   virtual-to-physical address translation.
   (anderson at redhat.com)

 - Update of the sample memory_driver/crash.c /dev/crash kernel driver
   to version 1.3, which adds support for Linux 4.6 and later ARM64
   kernels, kernels configured with CONFIG_HARDENED_USERCOPY, and
   S390X kernels use xlate_dev_mem_ptr() and unxlate_dev_mem_ptr() 
   instead of kmap() and kunmap().
   (anderson at redhat.com)