RHBA-2014:1414 - Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

Updated binutils packages that fix several bugs are now available for Red Hat
Enterprise Linux 6.

Description

The binutils packages provide a collection of binary utilities for the
manipulation of object code in various object file formats. It includes the
"ar", "as", "gprof", "ld", "nm", "objcopy", "objdump", "ranlib", "readelf",
"size", "strings", "strip", and "addr2line" utilities.

This update fixes the following bugs:

• Previously, the ld linker could overwrite a valid SONAME with an empty string

in a DT_NEEDED record. Consequently, certain programs were linked but could not
be executed because symbols from some libraries were not loaded. With this
update, the ld linker correctly handles empty strings in SONAMEs, and programs
linked by ld now can be executed as expected. (BZ#1128279)

• When creating a shared library for a "ppc64" target, the ld linker selected

linker stubs that were not thread-safe by default. Consequently, if such a
shared library was used by a multi-threaded application, calls into the library
could fail in unpredictable ways. To fix this problem, the ld linker now build
shared libraries for "ppc64" targets with thread-safe linker stubs. (BZ#906079)

• The readelf utility incorrectly assumed that a long name table would always be

available if an archive used long names. Consequently, readelf could terminate
unexpectedly with a segmentation fault on archive libraries that used long names
but did not have a long name table. To fix this problem, readelf now verifies
the existence of a long name table on archive libraries. (BZ#909056)

• The ld linker incorrectly handled certain TLS relocations that appears in

debugging (DWARF) sections. Consequently, debugging information for some
variables in TLS sections could be incorrect. With this update, the ld linker
now correctly handles TLS relocations in DWARF sections, and the related TLS
variables now can be properly examined. (BZ#959422)

Users of binutils are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix
these bugs.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure all previously released errata
relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via the Red Hat Network. Details on how to
use the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at
https://access.redhat.com/articles/11258

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 6 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian 6 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Scientific Computing 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support (for IBM z Systems) 6 s390x

Fixes

• BZ - 850832 - The binutils package contains the windmc(1) manual page but the utility is not included
• BZ - 870125 - binutils: wrong description of 'as -v' in man page
• BZ - 906079 - PLT Stubs on PPC are not thread safe
• BZ - 922393 - binutils-rh773526.patch patching readelf.c.readelf-dynamic~ instead of readelf.c
• BZ - 959422 - TLS variable wrongly relocated on .debug_info
• BZ - 1128279 - ld copies SONAME to DT_NEEDED without checking if it’s empty

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)