Re: [PATCH] Remove module reference counting.

From: Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk>
To: Stephen Hemminger <shemminger@osdl.org>
Cc: Rusty Russell <rusty@rustcorp.com.au>,
	davem@redhat.com, arjanv@redhat.com,
	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@transmeta.com>,
	greg@kroah.com,
	Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] Remove module reference counting.
Date: 26 Jul 2003 00:24:49 +0100	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <1059175489.1206.11.camel@dhcp22.swansea.linux.org.uk> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20030725122651.4aedc768.shemminger@osdl.org>

On Gwe, 2003-07-25 at 20:26, Stephen Hemminger wrote:
> > 	If module removal is to be a rare and unusual event, it
> > doesn't seem so sensible to go to great lengths in the code to handle
> > just that case.  In fact, it's easier to leave the module memory in
> > place, and not have the concept of parts of the kernel text (and some
> > types of kernel data) vanishing.

Uggh. There is a difference between taking the approach that some stuff
is hard to handle and gets into trouble for using MOD_INC/DEC so is
unsafe, and doing the locking from the caller, or arranging that you
know the device is quiescent in the unload path and not allowing
unloading to work properly.

I've got drivers that use MOD_INC/DEC and are technically unsafe, they
by default now don't unload and its an incentive to fix them. I'd hate
to have my box cluttering up and have to keep rebooting to test drivers
because of inept implementations however.