From e7600f5cee5de14065f950807931d6e6d40fb2d7 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Hans Verkuil Date: Fri, 17 Jul 2026 15:42:45 +0200 Subject: [PATCH] Revert "media: v4l2-dev: fix error handling in __video_register_device()" This reverts commit 2a934fdb01db6458288fc9386d3d8ceba6dd551a. The intentions of that patch were good, but it doesn't work. The idea is that if device_register fails, you have to do a put_device to let the ref counter release resources. However, the V4L2 API says that if video_register_device() fails, then you have to call video_device_release(), which kfree()s the video_device struct. But the put_device() will already have freed the struct, so you end up in a double-free scenario. There is not really a good way of fixing this without breaking video_register_device() into two parts, one that initializes everything, and one that does the actual device_register, and then converting all V4L2 drivers to this new model. That is a massive job, and it is very unlikely that device_register will fail. So rather than ending up in a double-free scenario, just revert this patch, and in that case we'll have a small memory leak. Which is a lot more robust. Reviewed-by: Laurent Pinchart Fixes: 2a934fdb01db ("media: v4l2-dev: fix error handling in __video_register_device()") Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org Link: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-media/20260520090624.1071139-1-lgs201920130244@gmail.com/ Link: https://lore.kernel.org/all/2026042058-charm-storable-4ad8@gregkh/ Signed-off-by: Hans Verkuil --- drivers/media/v4l2-core/v4l2-dev.c | 14 +++++++------- 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 7 deletions(-) diff --git a/drivers/media/v4l2-core/v4l2-dev.c b/drivers/media/v4l2-core/v4l2-dev.c index 5516b2bbb08f..d750bf10febe 100644 --- a/drivers/media/v4l2-core/v4l2-dev.c +++ b/drivers/media/v4l2-core/v4l2-dev.c @@ -1071,25 +1071,25 @@ int __video_register_device(struct video_device *vdev, vdev->dev.class = &video_class; vdev->dev.devt = MKDEV(VIDEO_MAJOR, vdev->minor); vdev->dev.parent = vdev->dev_parent; - vdev->dev.release = v4l2_device_release; dev_set_name(&vdev->dev, "%s%d", name_base, vdev->num); - - /* Increase v4l2_device refcount */ - v4l2_device_get(vdev->v4l2_dev); - mutex_lock(&videodev_lock); ret = device_register(&vdev->dev); if (ret < 0) { mutex_unlock(&videodev_lock); pr_err("%s: device_register failed\n", __func__); - put_device(&vdev->dev); - return ret; + goto cleanup; } + /* Register the release callback that will be called when the last + reference to the device goes away. */ + vdev->dev.release = v4l2_device_release; if (nr != -1 && nr != vdev->num && warn_if_nr_in_use) pr_warn("%s: requested %s%d, got %s\n", __func__, name_base, nr, video_device_node_name(vdev)); + /* Increase v4l2_device refcount */ + v4l2_device_get(vdev->v4l2_dev); + /* Part 5: Register the entity. */ ret = video_register_media_controller(vdev);