core: fix use-after-free in Surface.setSelection (#12894)

`setSelection` captured the previous selection, then called
`Screen.select` (which deinits the previous selection's tracked pins),
then compared the new selection against the now-freed previous pin via
`sel.eql(prev)`. That read freed pin memory (use-after-free).

The comparison was a copy-on-select optimization ("only re-copy if the
selection changed"). Remove it rather than repair it because:

- It never fired correctly. It compared against freed memory, so the
shipped behavior was already "always copy".

- It can't be repaired by copying `prev`'s pin before `Screen.select`.
That fixes the use-after-free but not the logic: the call sites (e.g.
mouse drag release) pass a selection equal to the one already set, so a
working `eql` skip would suppress the very copy those sites exist to
perform. A correct optimization would have to compare against the
last-copied selection (before the mouse event mutated the live one),
which would require extra state.

- It isn't worth tracking that additional state. The copy runs once per
selection gesture (mouse up, double-click), which isn't in a hot path,
so skipping a redundant re-copy only saves a single clipboard write.

Removing the skip eliminates the use-after-free and keeps the behavior
consistent with what we've already been doing.

---

_AI Disclosure_: Claude Opus 4.8 found this in a review while I was
working on adjacent code.
pull/11173/merge
Mitchell Hashimoto 2026-06-02 06:07:31 -07:00 committed by GitHub
commit 6246c288ae
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2 changed files with 27 additions and 5 deletions

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@ -2330,18 +2330,14 @@ fn copySelectionToClipboards(
///
/// This must be called with the renderer mutex held.
fn setSelection(self: *Surface, sel_: ?terminal.Selection) !void {
const prev_ = self.io.terminal.screens.active.selection;
try self.io.terminal.screens.active.select(sel_);
// If copy on select is false then exit early.
if (self.config.copy_on_select == .false) return;
// Set our selection clipboard. If the selection is cleared we do not
// clear the clipboard. If the selection is set, we only set the clipboard
// again if it changed, since setting the clipboard can be an expensive
// operation.
// clear the clipboard.
const sel = sel_ orelse return;
if (prev_) |prev| if (sel.eql(prev)) return;
switch (self.config.copy_on_select) {
.false => unreachable, // handled above with an early exit

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@ -7652,6 +7652,32 @@ test "Screen: select untracked" {
try testing.expectEqual(tracked, s.pages.countTrackedPins());
}
test "Screen: select replaces existing pins" {
const testing = std.testing;
const alloc = testing.allocator;
var s = try init(alloc, .{ .cols = 10, .rows = 10, .max_scrollback = 0 });
defer s.deinit();
try s.testWriteString("ABC DEF\n 123\n456");
const tracked = s.pages.countTrackedPins();
try s.select(Selection.init(
s.pages.pin(.{ .active = .{ .x = 0, .y = 0 } }).?,
s.pages.pin(.{ .active = .{ .x = 3, .y = 0 } }).?,
false,
));
try testing.expectEqual(tracked + 2, s.pages.countTrackedPins());
// Replacing the selection must untrack the prior selection's pins
// rather than leak them.
try s.select(Selection.init(
s.pages.pin(.{ .active = .{ .x = 0, .y = 1 } }).?,
s.pages.pin(.{ .active = .{ .x = 2, .y = 1 } }).?,
false,
));
try testing.expectEqual(tracked + 2, s.pages.countTrackedPins());
}
test "Screen: selectAll" {
const testing = std.testing;
const alloc = testing.allocator;