Ticket #127 (defect)

From http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&aid=1112549&group_id=5470&atid=105470

cgi.FieldStorage memory usage can spike in line-oriented ops
Various parts of cgi.FieldStorage call its
"read_lines_to_outerboundary", "read_lines" and
"skip_lines" methods. These methods use the
"readline" method of the file object that represents an
input stream. The input stream is typically data
supplied by an untrusted source (such as a user
uploading a file from a web browser). The input data
is not required by the RFC 822/1521/1522/1867
specifications to contain any newline characters. For
example, it is within the bounds of the specification
to supply a a multipart/form-data input stream with a
"file-data" part that consists of a 2GB string composed
entirely of "x" characters (which happens to be
something I did that led me to noticing this bug).

The simplest fix is to make use of the "size" argument
of the readline method of the file object where it is
used within all parts of FieldStorage that make use of
it. A patch against the Python 2.3.4 cgi.py module
that does this is attached.