race in java.lang.reflect.Field could make UnsafeStaticFieldAccessorImpl#base seen as null

[Peter Levart]

Hi all,

There're two fields in java.lang.reflect.Field that are used to cache 
FieldAccessors:

     // Cached field accessor created without override
     private FieldAccessor fieldAccessor;
     // Cached field accessor created with override
     private FieldAccessor overrideFieldAccessor;

Lazy initialization and caching is performed without any 
synchronization. The FieldAccessor instance is cached on both: the Field 
instance that can be seen outside the Class object and the "root" field 
instance that is referenced by the former instance. FieldAccessor can 
therefore be dereferenced by a thread that did not construct it via a 
race. All fields in various FieldAccessors are final except 
sun.reflect.UnsafeStaticFieldAccessorImpl#base. It can theoretically 
happen that accessing a static field via reflection is performed with a 
null base reference.

I haven't been able to reproduce this theoretical possibility, but It 
may happen in some situations.

The fix is simple - transform the field to final - it is only 
initialized in the constructor.


Regards, Peter