linux/include
Christian Brauner 12ae2c81b2
clone: add CLONE_AUTOREAP
Add a new clone3() flag CLONE_AUTOREAP that makes a child process
auto-reap on exit without ever becoming a zombie. This is a per-process
property in contrast to the existing auto-reap mechanism via
SA_NOCLDWAIT or SIG_IGN for SIGCHLD which applies to all children of a
given parent.

Currently the only way to automatically reap children is to set
SA_NOCLDWAIT or SIG_IGN on SIGCHLD. This is a parent-scoped property
affecting all children which makes it unsuitable for libraries or
applications that need selective auto-reaping of specific children while
still being able to wait() on others.

CLONE_AUTOREAP stores an autoreap flag in the child's signal_struct.
When the child exits do_notify_parent() checks this flag and causes
exit_notify() to transition the task directly to EXIT_DEAD. Since the
flag lives on the child it survives reparenting: if the original parent
exits and the child is reparented to a subreaper or init the child still
auto-reaps when it eventually exits.

CLONE_AUTOREAP can be combined with CLONE_PIDFD to allow the parent to
monitor the child's exit via poll() and retrieve exit status via
PIDFD_GET_INFO. Without CLONE_PIDFD it provides a fire-and-forget
pattern where the parent simply doesn't care about the child's exit
status. No exit signal is delivered so exit_signal must be zero.

CLONE_AUTOREAP is rejected in combination with CLONE_PARENT. If a
CLONE_AUTOREAP child were to clone(CLONE_PARENT) the new grandchild
would inherit exit_signal == 0 from the autoreap parent's group leader
but without signal->autoreap. This grandchild would become a zombie that
never sends a signal and is never autoreaped - confusing and arguably
broken behavior.

The flag is not inherited by the autoreap process's own children. Each
child that should be autoreaped must be explicitly created with
CLONE_AUTOREAP.

Link: https://github.com/uapi-group/kernel-features/issues/45
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260226-work-pidfs-autoreap-v5-1-d148b984a989@kernel.org
Reviewed-by: Oleg Nesterov <oleg@redhat.com>
Signed-off-by: Christian Brauner <brauner@kernel.org>
2026-03-11 23:14:02 +01:00
..
acpi mailbox: platform and core updates 2026-02-14 11:13:32 -08:00
asm-generic hyperv-next for v7.0 2026-02-20 08:48:31 -08:00
clocksource
crypto Networking changes for 7.0 2026-02-11 19:31:52 -08:00
cxl ACPI: extlog: Trace CPER CXL Protocol Error Section 2026-01-14 17:09:34 +01:00
drm drm/pagemap: pass pagemap_addr by reference 2026-02-17 19:39:44 -05:00
dt-bindings phy-for-7.0 2026-02-17 11:40:04 -08:00
hyperv hyperv-next for v7.0 2026-02-20 08:48:31 -08:00
keys keys/trusted_keys: establish PKWM as a trusted source 2026-01-30 09:27:26 +05:30
kunit treewide: Replace kmalloc with kmalloc_obj for non-scalar types 2026-02-21 01:02:28 -08:00
kvm KVM: arm64: Use standard seq_file iterator for vgic-debug debugfs 2026-02-02 10:59:25 +00:00
linux clone: add CLONE_AUTOREAP 2026-03-11 23:14:02 +01:00
math-emu
media [GIT PULL for v7.0] media updates 2026-02-11 12:20:25 -08:00
memory
misc
net Convert more 'alloc_obj' cases to default GFP_KERNEL arguments 2026-02-21 20:03:00 -08:00
pcmcia
ras PCI/AER: Report CXL or PCIe bus type in AER trace logging 2026-01-22 15:07:04 -07:00
rdma RDMA v7.0 merge window 2026-02-12 17:05:20 -08:00
rv rv: Fix multiple definition of __pcpu_unique_da_mon_this 2026-02-20 13:12:00 +01:00
scsi SCSI misc on 20260212 2026-02-12 15:43:02 -08:00
soc Reset controller updates for v6.20 2026-01-29 10:24:25 +01:00
sound ASoC: Updates for v7.0 2026-02-09 17:39:11 +01:00
target
trace vfs-7.0-rc1.misc.2 2026-02-16 13:00:36 -08:00
uapi clone: add CLONE_AUTOREAP 2026-03-11 23:14:02 +01:00
ufs scsi: ufs: host: mediatek: Require CONFIG_PM 2026-02-03 22:28:44 -05:00
vdso vdso: Switch get/put_unaligned() from packed struct to memcpy() 2026-01-14 08:56:41 +01:00
video
xen Partial revert "x86/xen: fix balloon target initialization for PVH dom0" 2026-02-02 07:31:22 +01:00
Kbuild