[PATCH 00/11] fix memory leak while kset_register() fails

[Luben Tuikov]

On 2022-10-21 04:18, Greg KH wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 21, 2022 at 03:55:18AM -0400, Luben Tuikov wrote:
>> On 2022-10-21 01:37, Greg KH wrote:
>>> On Fri, Oct 21, 2022 at 01:29:31AM -0400, Luben Tuikov wrote:
>>>> On 2022-10-20 22:20, Yang Yingliang wrote:
>>>>> The previous discussion link:
>>>>> https://nam11.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Flore.kernel.org%2Flkml%2F0db486eb-6927-927e-3629-958f8f211194%40huawei.com%2FT%2F&data=05%7C01%7Cluben.tuikov%40amd.com%7Cd41da3fd6449492d01f808dab33cdb75%7C3dd8961fe4884e608e11a82d994e183d%7C0%7C0%7C638019371236833115%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=C%2Bj1THkHpzVGks5eqB%2Fm%2FPAkMRohR7CYvRnOCqUqdcM%3D&reserved=0
>>>>
>>>> The very first discussion on this was here:
>>>>
>>>> https://nam11.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.spinics.net%2Flists%2Fdri-devel%2Fmsg368077.html&data=05%7C01%7Cluben.tuikov%40amd.com%7Cd41da3fd6449492d01f808dab33cdb75%7C3dd8961fe4884e608e11a82d994e183d%7C0%7C0%7C638019371236833115%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=pSR10abmK8nAMvKSezqWC0SPUBL4qEwtCCizyIKW7Dc%3D&reserved=0
>>>>
>>>> Please use this link, and not the that one up there you which quoted above,
>>>> and whose commit description is taken verbatim from the this link.
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> kset_register() is currently used in some places without calling
>>>>> kset_put() in error path, because the callers think it should be
>>>>> kset internal thing to do, but the driver core can not know what
>>>>> caller doing with that memory at times. The memory could be freed
>>>>> both in kset_put() and error path of caller, if it is called in
>>>>> kset_register().
>>>>
>>>> As I explained in the link above, the reason there's
>>>> a memory leak is that one cannot call kset_register() without
>>>> the kset->kobj.name being set--kobj_add_internal() returns -EINVAL,
>>>> in this case, i.e. kset_register() fails with -EINVAL.
>>>>
>>>> Thus, the most common usage is something like this:
>>>>
>>>> 	kobj_set_name(&kset->kobj, format, ...);
>>>> 	kset->kobj.kset = parent_kset;
>>>> 	kset->kobj.ktype = ktype;
>>>> 	res = kset_register(kset);
>>>>
>>>> So, what is being leaked, is the memory allocated in kobj_set_name(),
>>>> by the common idiom shown above. This needs to be mentioned in
>>>> the documentation, at least, in case, in the future this is absolved
>>>> in kset_register() redesign, etc.
>>>
>>> Based on this, can kset_register() just clean up from itself when an
>>> error happens?  Ideally that would be the case, as the odds of a kset
>>> being embedded in a larger structure is probably slim, but we would have
>>> to search the tree to make sure.
>>
>> Looking at kset_register(), we can add kset_put() in the error path,
>> when kobject_add_internal(&kset->kobj) fails.
>>
>> See the attached patch. It needs to be tested with the same error injection
>> as Yang has been doing.
>>
>> Now, struct kset is being embedded in larger structs--see amdgpu_discovery.c
>> starting at line 575. If you're on an AMD system, it gets you the tree
>> structure you'll see when you run "tree /sys/class/drm/card0/device/ip_discovery/".
>> That shouldn't be a problem though.
> 
> Yes, that shouldn't be an issue as the kobject embedded in a kset is
> ONLY for that kset itself, the kset structure should not be controling
> the lifespan of the object it is embedded in, right?

Yes, and it doesn't. It only does a kobject_get(parent) and kobject_put(parent).
So that's fine and natural.

Yang, do you want to try the patch in my previous email in this thread, since you've
got the error injection set up already?

Regards,
Luben