RHBA-2014:1483 - Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

Updated numactl packages that fix several bugs and add various enhancements are
now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

Description

The numactl packages add simple Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA) policy support.
It consists of the numactl program to run other programs with a specific NUMA
policy, and the libnuma library to perform allocations with NUMA policy in
applications.

The numactl packages have been upgraded to upstream version 2.0.9, which
provides a number of bug fixes and enhancements over the previous version.
(BZ#1017048)

This update also fixes the following bugs:

• Prior to this update, the numa_parse_cpustring() function added an unallowed

CPU into its bitmask. As a consequence, only the bits the user has access to
were set. Consequently, every time the function was used led to different
outcomes. With this update, the numa_parse_cpustring() code sets all bits in the
"cpustring" argument regardless of current task's CPU mask, and the
aforementioned scenario no longer occurs. (BZ#812462)

• Previously, the compiler was enforcing libnuma to provide a constant within

the "char*" parameter, which led to the following warning message being
returned:

testconst.c:10:45: warning: deprecated conversion from string constant
to ‘char*’ [-Wwrite-strings]

The underlying source code has been fixed so that the string is handled as a
constant, and the user no longer receives warning messages. (BZ#819133)

• Previously, when the user set the affinity of the shell to be a subset of

available CPUs and then attempted to use the numactl utility to bind to
something absent from that affinity mask, the attempt failed. An upstream patch
has been applied to fix this bug, and the numactl environment has been extended
so that the user can choose whether to allow for the affinity mask to determine
available CPUs or not. (BZ#873456)

• Due to incompatibilities emerging after the latest numactl packages update,

virsh processes terminated unexpectedly when any virsh command was run. This bug
has been fixed, and the virsh commands now work correctly. (BZ#1100134)

Users of numactl are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix
these bugs and add these enhancements.

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/site/articles/11258

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support 6 x86_64
• 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 Power, big endian 6 ppc64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Scientific Computing 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server from RHUI 6 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension 6 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server - Extended Life Cycle Support Extension 6 i386

Fixes

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)