Problem

solana-test-validator doesn't verify program ELFs when creating its genesis configuration.

For example, if an ELf contains a restricted functionality, e.g. mutable static data (as mentioned in coral-xyz/anchor#3403), the validator starts without any indication of an error.

Reproduction

Program lib.rs:

use solana_program::{
    account_info::AccountInfo, entrypoint, entrypoint::ProgramResult, pubkey::Pubkey,
};

entrypoint!(process);

static INVALID: std::sync::OnceLock<bool> = std::sync::OnceLock::new();

pub fn process(_program_id: &Pubkey, _accounts: &[AccountInfo], _data: &[u8]) -> ProgramResult {
    INVALID.get_or_init(|| false);
    Ok(())
}

Run:

cargo build-sbf
solana-test-validator --bpf-program invaLidELF111111111111111111111111111111111 target/deploy/program.so

Details

Instead of getting an error during the start of the test-validator, loading an invalid program ELF results in a seemingly unrelated error during runtime when trying to invoke the program:

Example transaction logs:

Program invaLidELF111111111111111111111111111111111 invoke [1]
Program is not deployed
Program invaLidELF111111111111111111111111111111111 failed: Unsupported program id

This behavior differs from solana program deploy, which verifies the ELFs before deploying them. Trying to deploy an invalid ELF fails with EbpfError::ElfError and outputs something similar to the following:

Error: ELF error: ELF error: Failed to parse ELF file: Section or symbol name `.bss._ZN6native7` is longer than `16` bytes

Solution

Verify program ELFs before adding them to the genesis configuration.