- Issued:
- 2004-08-18
- Updated:
- 2004-08-18
RHBA-2004:155 - Bug Fix Advisory
Synopsis
Updated XFree86 packages fix memory faults on Itanium
Type/Severity
Bug Fix Advisory
Topic
Updated XFree86 packages that fix X server memory faults on Itanium systems
are now available.
Description
XFree86 is an open source implementation of the X Window System.
The XFree86 X server contains its own module loader. For security
reasons, the operating system does not normally permit the execution of
code in data memory; however, this is how the XFree86 loader operates. To
do so, the XFree86 loader must inform the operating system that it is
allowed to execute code loaded in specific data areas.
On Itanium systems, one of these data areas (the PLT - Procedure
Linkage Table) was not marked as being executable. This went unnoticed
because the PLT is only invoked for procedure calls that involve long
displacements, which is not typical. The omission was first noticed with
the NVIDIA propietary driver. The resulting symptom was the operating
system aborted the X server process due to a memory fault.
Support has been added for the ATI Radeon driver (radeon), a custom
triplehead Radeon 7000 interface that is present in some newer Dell server
hardware.
The 'savage' driver has been updated to a newer upstream release, which
was inadvertently left out of the previous XFree86 update.
Users of XFree86 on Itanium systems should upgrade to these updated
packages, which resolve this issue.
Solution
Before applying this update, make sure all previously released errata
relevant to your system have been applied.
To update all RPMs for your particular architecture, run:
rpm -Fvh [filenames]
where [filenames] is a list of the RPMs you wish to upgrade. Only those
RPMs which are currently installed will be updated. Those RPMs which are
not installed but included in the list will not be updated. Note that you
can also use wildcards (*.rpm) if your current directory *only* contains the
desired RPMs.
Please note that this update is also available via Red Hat Network. Many
people find this an easier way to apply updates. To use Red Hat Network,
launch the Red Hat Update Agent with the following command:
up2date
This will start an interactive process that will result in the appropriate
RPMs being upgraded on your system.
If up2date fails to connect to Red Hat Network due to SSL
Certificate Errors, you need to install a version of the
up2date client with an updated certificate. The latest version of
up2date is available from the Red Hat FTP site and may also be
downloaded directly from the RHN website:
Affected Products
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 2 ia64
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 2 i386
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 2 ia64
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 2 i386
Fixes
(none)CVEs
(none)
References
(none)
The Red Hat security contact is secalert@redhat.com. More contact details at https://access.redhat.com/security/team/contact/.