Read the system boot time from /proc instead of computing

Read the time of system boot from /proc/stat (entry: btime) instead
of computing it as the difference between the current time and the
uptime. This is the only way to get a consistent result which won't
possibly change from one run to the next.

The problems with the original code were:
* Both the current time and the uptime are rounded down to the second,
  but the system doesn't boot on an integer second value so they do not
  tick at the same moment. Thus, the rounding errors can cause a one
  second difference from one run to the next.
* We can't read the uptime and the current time at the exact same moment
  anyway, so the time difference we compute is bound to be inaccurate.
Bug-Redhat: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=222251
Author: Jean Delvare <jdelvare@suse.de>
Reviewed-by: Craig Small <csmall@debian.org>

4 files changed, 35 insertions, 7 deletions

diff --git a/proc/library.map b/proc/library.map
index a38627b..b438849 100644
--- a/proc/library.map
+++ b/proc/library.map
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ global:
   openproc; closeproc;
   tty_to_dev; dev_to_tty; open_psdb_message; open_psdb; lookup_wchan;
   display_version; procps_version; linux_version_code;
-  Hertz; smp_num_cpus; have_privs;
+  Hertz; smp_num_cpus; have_privs; getbtime;
   sprint_uptime; uptime; user_from_uid; print_uptime; loadavg;
   pretty_print_signals; print_given_signals; unix_print_signals; signal_name_to_number; signal_number_to_name;
   meminfo; vminfo; getstat; getdiskstat; getpartitions_num; getslabinfo; get_pid_digits;
diff --git a/proc/sysinfo.c b/proc/sysinfo.c
index cd59534..7ef68c5 100644
--- a/proc/sysinfo.c
+++ b/proc/sysinfo.c
@@ -90,6 +90,35 @@ int uptime(double *restrict uptime_secs, double *restrict idle_secs) {
     return up;	/* assume never be zero seconds in practice */
 }
 
+unsigned long getbtime(void) {
+    static unsigned long btime = 0;
+    FILE *f;
+
+    if (btime)
+	return btime;
+
+    /* /proc/stat can get very large on multi-CPU systems so we
+       can't use FILE_TO_BUF */
+    if (!(f = fopen(STAT_FILE, "r"))) {
+	fputs(BAD_OPEN_MESSAGE, stderr);
+	fflush(NULL);
+	_exit(102);
+    }
+
+    while ((fgets(buf, sizeof buf, f))) {
+        if (sscanf(buf, "btime %lu", &btime) == 1)
+            break;
+    }
+    fclose(f);
+
+    if (!btime) {
+	fputs("missing btime in " STAT_FILE "\n", stderr);
+	exit(1);
+    }
+
+    return btime;
+}
+
 /***********************************************************************
  * Some values in /proc are expressed in units of 1/HZ seconds, where HZ
  * is the kernel clock tick rate. One of these units is called a jiffy.
diff --git a/proc/sysinfo.h b/proc/sysinfo.h
index e30a38b..97ae818 100644
--- a/proc/sysinfo.h
+++ b/proc/sysinfo.h
@@ -17,6 +17,7 @@ extern void eight_cpu_numbers(JT *uret, JT *nret, JT *sret, JT *iret, JT *wret,
 #endif
 
 extern int        uptime (double *uptime_secs, double *idle_secs);
+extern unsigned long getbtime(void);
 extern void       loadavg(double *av1, double *av5, double *av15);
 
 
diff --git a/ps/output.c b/ps/output.c
index b4905c2..338cf1a 100644
--- a/ps/output.c
+++ b/ps/output.c
@@ -77,7 +77,6 @@ static unsigned max_leftward = 0x12345678; /* space for LEFT stuff */
 static int wide_signals;  /* true if we have room */
 
 static unsigned long seconds_since_1970;
-static unsigned long time_of_boot;
 static unsigned long page_shift;
 
 
@@ -813,7 +812,7 @@ static int pr_bsdtime(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const
 static int pr_bsdstart(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const pp){
   time_t start;
   time_t seconds_ago;
-  start = time_of_boot + pp->start_time / Hertz;
+  start = getbtime() + pp->start_time / Hertz;
   seconds_ago = seconds_since_1970 - start;
   if(seconds_ago < 0) seconds_ago=0;
   if(seconds_ago > 3600*24)  strcpy(outbuf, ctime(&start)+4);
@@ -927,7 +926,7 @@ static int pr_pmem(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const pp)
 
 static int pr_lstart(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const pp){
   time_t t;
-  t = time_of_boot + pp->start_time / Hertz;
+  t = getbtime() + pp->start_time / Hertz;
   return snprintf(outbuf, COLWID, "%24.24s", ctime(&t));
 }
 
@@ -950,7 +949,7 @@ static int pr_stime(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const pp
   our_time = localtime(&seconds_since_1970);   /* not reentrant */
   tm_year = our_time->tm_year;
   tm_yday = our_time->tm_yday;
-  t = time_of_boot + pp->start_time / Hertz;
+  t = getbtime() + pp->start_time / Hertz;
   proc_time = localtime(&t); /* not reentrant, this corrupts our_time */
   fmt = "%H:%M";                                   /* 03:02 23:59 */
   if(tm_yday != proc_time->tm_yday) fmt = "%b%d";  /* Jun06 Aug27 */
@@ -961,7 +960,7 @@ static int pr_stime(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const pp
 static int pr_start(char *restrict const outbuf, const proc_t *restrict const pp){
   time_t t;
   char *str;
-  t = time_of_boot + pp->start_time / Hertz;
+  t = getbtime() + pp->start_time / Hertz;
   str = ctime(&t);
   if(str[8]==' ')  str[8]='0';
   if(str[11]==' ') str[11]='0';
@@ -1982,7 +1981,6 @@ void init_output(void){
   // available space:  page_size*outbuf_pages-SPACE_AMOUNT
 
   seconds_since_1970 = time(NULL);
-  time_of_boot = seconds_since_1970 - seconds_since_boot;
 
   meminfo();