参考内核5.x, 主要关注下资源释放。

/**
* device_register - register a device with the system.
* @dev: pointer to the device structure
*
* This happens in two clean steps - initialize the device
* and add it to the system. The two steps can be called
* separately, but this is the easiest and most common.
* I.e. you should only call the two helpers separately if
* have a clearly defined need to use and refcount the device
* before it is added to the hierarchy.
*
* For more information, see the kerneldoc for device_initialize()
* and device_add().
*
* NOTE: _Never_ directly free @dev after calling this function, even
* if it returned an error! Always use put_device() to give up the
* reference initialized in this function instead.
*/
int device_register(struct device *dev)
{
device_initialize(dev);
return device_add(dev);
}

device_add()可能失败。

注意有个NOTE,不要直接free @dev,即使device_add() fails,用put_device()取代。

配对使用的是unregister:

/**
* device_unregister - unregister device from system.
* @dev: device going away.
*
* We do this in two parts, like we do device_register(). First,
* we remove it from all the subsystems with device_del(), then
* we decrement the reference count via put_device(). If that
* is the final reference count, the device will be cleaned up
* via device_release() above. Otherwise, the structure will
* stick around until the final reference to the device is dropped.
*/
void device_unregister(struct device *dev)
{
pr_debug("device: '%s': %s\n", dev_name(dev), __func__);
device_del(dev);
put_device(dev);
}

put_device()会decrement reference count,then call device_release() if ref count
is final,zero?

先看几个相关结构成员:

/**
* struct device - The basic device structure
* @parent: The device's "parent" device, the device to which it is attached.
* In most cases, a parent device is some sort of bus or host
* controller. If parent is NULL, the device, is a top-level device,
* which is not usually what you want.
* @p: Holds the private data of the driver core portions of the device.
* See the comment of the struct device_private for detail.
* @kobj: A top-level, abstract class from which other classes are derived.
* @init_name: Initial name of the device.
* @type: The type of device.
* This identifies the device type and carries type-specific
* information.

struct device {
struct device *parent;
struct device_private *p;
struct kobject kobj;

注意struct device会有个kobj抽象类。

/**
* put_device - decrement reference count.
* @dev: device in question.
*/
void put_device(struct device *dev)
{
/* might_sleep(); */
if (dev)
kobject_put(&dev->kobj);
}

kobject_put():

/**
* kobject_put() - Decrement refcount for object.
* @kobj: object.
*
* Decrement the refcount, and if 0, call kobject_cleanup().
*/
void kobject_put(struct kobject *kobj)
{
if (kobj) {
if (!kobj->state_initialized)
WARN(1, KERN_WARNING
"kobject: '%s' (%p): is not initialized, yet kobject_put() is being called.\n",
kobject_name(kobj), kobj);
kref_put(&kobj->kref, kobject_release);
}
}

kref_put():

/**
* kref_put - decrement refcount for object.
* @kref: object.
* @release: pointer to the function that will clean up the object when the
* last reference to the object is released.
* This pointer is required, and it is not acceptable to pass kfree
* in as this function.
*
* Decrement the refcount, and if 0, call release().
* Return 1 if the object was removed, otherwise return 0. Beware, if this
* function returns 0, you still can not count on the kref from remaining in
* memory. Only use the return value if you want to see if the kref is now
* gone, not present.
*/
static inline int kref_put(struct kref *kref, void (*release)(struct kref *kref))
{
if (refcount_dec_and_test(&kref->refcount)) {
release(kref);
return 1;
}
return 0;
}

refcount is 0 就call release()也就是kobject_release():

static void kobject_release(struct kref *kref)
{
struct kobject *kobj = container_of(kref, struct kobject, kref);
#ifdef CONFIG_DEBUG_KOBJECT_RELEASE
unsigned long delay = HZ + HZ * (get_random_int() & 0x3);
pr_info("kobject: '%s' (%p): %s, parent %p (delayed %ld)\n",
kobject_name(kobj), kobj, __func__, kobj->parent, delay);
INIT_DELAYED_WORK(&kobj->release, kobject_delayed_cleanup);

schedule_delayed_work(&kobj->release, delay);
#else
kobject_cleanup(kobj);
#endif
}
/*
* kobject_cleanup - free kobject resources.
* @kobj: object to cleanup
*/
static void kobject_cleanup(struct kobject *kobj)
{
struct kobj_type *t = get_ktype(kobj);
const char *name = kobj->name;
...
if (t && t->release) {
pr_debug("kobject: '%s' (%p): calling ktype release\n",
kobject_name(kobj), kobj);
t->release(kobj);
}
...
}

这里有个callback ->release,是struct kobj_type的类型。一般都是在init定义的,rt? 找啊找:

void device_initialize(struct device *dev)
{
dev->kobj.kset = devices_kset;
kobject_init(&dev->kobj, &device_ktype); //tj: here
INIT_LIST_HEAD(&dev->dma_pools);
...
}

static struct kobj_type device_ktype = {
.release = device_release,
.sysfs_ops = &dev_sysfs_ops,
.namespace = device_namespace,
};

kobject_init():

/**
* kobject_init() - Initialize a kobject structure.
* @kobj: pointer to the kobject to initialize
* @ktype: pointer to the ktype for this kobject.
*
* This function will properly initialize a kobject such that it can then
* be passed to the kobject_add() call.
*
* After this function is called, the kobject MUST be cleaned up by a call
* to kobject_put(), not by a call to kfree directly to ensure that all of
* the memory is cleaned up properly.
*/
void kobject_init(struct kobject *kobj, struct kobj_type *ktype)
{
char *err_str;

if (!kobj) {
err_str = "invalid kobject pointer!";
goto error;
}
if (!ktype) {
err_str = "must have a ktype to be initialized properly!\n";
goto error;
}
if (kobj->state_initialized) {
/* do not error out as sometimes we can recover */
pr_err("kobject (%p): tried to init an initialized object, something is seriously wrong.\n",
kobj);
dump_stack();
}

kobject_init_internal(kobj);
kobj->ktype = ktype; //tj: here
return;
...
}
static void kobject_init_internal(struct kobject *kobj)
{
if (!kobj)
return;
kref_init(&kobj->kref);

/**
* kref_init - initialize object.
* @kref: object in question.
*/
static inline void kref_init(struct kref *kref)
{
refcount_set(&kref->refcount, 1); //tj: refcount = 1
}

drv设置的name其实就是kobj的name,比如devfreq:

dev_set_name(&devfreq->dev, "devfreq%d",
atomic_inc_return(&devfreq_no));
/**
* dev_set_name - set a device name
* @dev: device
* @fmt: format string for the device's name
*/
int dev_set_name(struct device *dev, const char *fmt, ...)
{
va_list vargs;
int err;

va_start(vargs, fmt);
err = kobject_set_name_vargs(&dev->kobj, fmt, vargs);
va_end(vargs);
return err;
}

/**
* kobject_set_name_vargs() - Set the name of a kobject.
* @kobj: struct kobject to set the name of
* @fmt: format string used to build the name
* @vargs: vargs to format the string.
*/
int kobject_set_name_vargs(struct kobject *kobj, const char *fmt,
va_list vargs)
{
const char *s;

if (kobj->name && !fmt)
return 0;
...
kobj->name = s; //tj: set kobj->name

return 0;
}

我们回头看t->release callback:

/**
* device_release - free device structure.
* @kobj: device's kobject.
*
* This is called once the reference count for the object
* reaches 0. We forward the call to the device's release
* method, which should handle actually freeing the structure.
*/
static void device_release(struct kobject *kobj)
{
struct device *dev = kobj_to_dev(kobj);
struct device_private *p = dev->p;

/*
* Some platform devices are driven without driver attached
* and managed resources may have been acquired. Make sure
* all resources are released.
*
* Drivers still can add resources into device after device
* is deleted but alive, so release devres here to avoid
* possible memory leak.
*/
devres_release_all(dev);

if (dev->release)
dev->release(dev);
else if (dev->type && dev->type->release)
dev->type->release(dev);
else if (dev->class && dev->class->dev_release)
dev->class->dev_release(dev);
else
WARN(1, KERN_ERR "Device '%s' does not have a release() function, it is broken and must be fixed. See Documentation/kobject.txt.\n",
dev_name(dev));
kfree(p);
}

能看到有三个->release callback check,必须有一个->release。注意一般drv在这里call kfree()。

kfree(p)来由:

static int device_private_init(struct device *dev)
{
dev->p = kzalloc(sizeof(*dev->p), GFP_KERNEL); //tj: malloc
if (!dev->p)
return -ENOMEM;
dev->p->device = dev;
klist_init(&dev->p->klist_children, klist_children_get,
klist_children_put);
INIT_LIST_HEAD(&dev->p->deferred_probe);
return 0;
}

来看下device_add():

/**
* device_add - add device to device hierarchy.
* @dev: device.
*
* This is part 2 of device_register(), though may be called
* separately _iff_ device_initialize() has been called separately.
*
* This adds @dev to the kobject hierarchy via kobject_add(), adds it
* to the global and sibling lists for the device, then
* adds it to the other relevant subsystems of the driver model.
*
* Do not call this routine or device_register() more than once for
* any device structure. The driver model core is not designed to work
* with devices that get unregistered and then spring back to life.
* (Among other things, it's very hard to guarantee that all references
* to the previous incarnation of @dev have been dropped.) Allocate
* and register a fresh new struct device instead.
*
* NOTE: _Never_ directly free @dev after calling this function, even
* if it returned an error! Always use put_device() to give up your
* reference instead.
*
* Rule of thumb is: if device_add() succeeds, you should call
* device_del() when you want to get rid of it. If device_add() has
* *not* succeeded, use *only* put_device() to drop the reference
* count.
*/
int device_add(struct device *dev)
{
dev = get_device(dev); //tj: see below
if (!dev)
goto done;

if (!dev->p) {
error = device_private_init(dev);
if (error)
goto done;
}
...
done:
put_device(dev);
return error;
SysEntryError:
...
parent_error:
put_device(parent);
name_error:
kfree(dev->p);
dev->p = NULL;
goto done;
}
/**
* get_device - increment reference count for device.
* @dev: device.
*
* This simply forwards the call to kobject_get(), though
* we do take care to provide for the case that we get a NULL
* pointer passed in.
*/
struct device *get_device(struct device *dev)
{
return dev ? kobj_to_dev(kobject_get(&dev->kobj)) : NULL;
}

so device_add()不管成功失败,都先恢复下ref count via put_device(), 此时ref count恢复成初始值1了,rt?

如果失败,call put_device()此时应该会call device_release()

如果成功了,put_device()放到了unregister里了。

Done.