[openssl-dev] Changing/deleted ordinals for exported function in the Windows DLLs

[Jeffrey Walton]

It looks like ordinals are changing and/or being removed for functions
exported by the Windows DLL. Its causing pain points for users in the
field, and it appears to be trending. Confer:

 * WAMP OpenSSL ordinal 372 error, http://stackoverflow.com/q/36238887
 * The Ordinal 112 could not be located in dynamic link library…,
http://stackoverflow.com/q/36163468

I think ordinals were meant to speed up loading of shared resources in
the 16-bit Windows days. They fell out of favor circa Windows 95.
According to Jeffrey Richter and in his book Programming Applications
for Microsoft Windows, page 701 (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1572319968):

The second form [of the function GetProcAddress]  ...
[and the] pszSymbolName parameter indicates the
ordinal number of the symbol whose address you
want...

Again, let me reiterate that Microsoft strongly
discourages the use of ordinals.

Richter then goes on to discuss getting the wrong function address
because ordinals have changed.

It seems like the changes should have been caught in the engineering
process during QA or testing. Perhaps an explicit step should be added
to avoid the problems in the future?
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Re: [openssl-dev] Changing/deleted ordinals for exported function in the Windows DLLs

[Richard Levitte]

In message  
on Sun, 27 Mar 2016 06:09:39 -0400, Jeffrey Walton  said:

noloader> It looks like ordinals are changing and/or being removed for functions
noloader> exported by the Windows DLL. Its causing pain points for users in the
noloader> field, and it appears to be trending. Confer:
noloader> 
noloader>  * WAMP OpenSSL ordinal 372 error, http://stackoverflow.com/q/36238887
noloader>  * The Ordinal 112 could not be located in dynamic link library…,
noloader> http://stackoverflow.com/q/36163468

I sure hope noone is using OpenSSL 1.1.0 in production.  The .num
files were recreated entirely just before beta1.

So, if we assume that this is about 1.0.2, this is what I can grep:

: ; egrep '\s(112|372)\s' util/*.num 
util/libeay.num:BN_MONT_CTX_free112 EXIST::FUNCTION:
util/libeay.num:PEM_SealInit372 
EXIST::FUNCTION:RSA
util/ssleay.num:SSLv23_server_method112 
EXIST::FUNCTION:RSA
util/ssleay.num:SSL_CONF_cmd_argv   372 EXIST::FUNCTION:

You notice the ":RSA" at the end?  That means that if the library was
created with the 'no-rsa' config option, those locations will be empty
in the transfer table.  I can't say for sure that's the case, but it's
a possible lead to follow.

Either way, it does seem to me that someone didn't keep the OpenSSL
libraries in check, somehow.

Btw, when it comes to OpenSSL 1.1.0, the DLLs have embedded version
numbers in the file name.

noloader> I think ordinals were meant to speed up loading of shared resources in
noloader> the 16-bit Windows days. They fell out of favor circa Windows 95.
noloader> According to Jeffrey Richter and in his book Programming Applications
noloader> for Microsoft Windows, page 701 (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1572319968):
noloader> 
noloader> The second form [of the function GetProcAddress]  ...
noloader> [and the] pszSymbolName parameter indicates the
noloader> ordinal number of the symbol whose address you
noloader> want...
noloader> 
noloader> Again, let me reiterate that Microsoft strongly
noloader> discourages the use of ordinals.
noloader> 
noloader> Richter then goes on to discuss getting the wrong function address
noloader> because ordinals have changed.
noloader> 
noloader> It seems like the changes should have been caught in the engineering
noloader> process during QA or testing. Perhaps an explicit step should be added
noloader> to avoid the problems in the future?

Possbly.  Either way, it's a bit late in the game to make that change.

Cheers,
Richard

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Richard Levitte levi...@openssl.org
OpenSSL Project http://www.openssl.org/~levitte/
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Re: [openssl-dev] Changing/deleted ordinals for exported function in the Windows DLLs

[Andy Polyakov]

> It looks like ordinals are changing and/or being removed for functions
> exported by the Windows DLL. Its causing pain points for users in the
> field, and it appears to be trending. Confer:
> 
>  * WAMP OpenSSL ordinal 372 error, http://stackoverflow.com/q/36238887
>  * The Ordinal 112 could not be located in dynamic link library…,
> http://stackoverflow.com/q/36163468

This can be a bit misleading in sense that it doesn't have to be related
to ordinals per se. I mean if an application calls a function from DLL,
if you remove that function from DLL, it doesn't matter how it was
exposed, by ordinal or by name. If exposed by name, then error message
would be more readable, or less ambiguous, but application will fail to
start in either case. In other words I agree with Richard's suggestion
that someone fails to keep OpenSSL DLLs in check, and say that failure
to do so would have similar effect irregardless whether or not we stick
with ordinals or not.

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