Re: [RFC PATCH 0/4] device_schedule_reprobe(): core helper and conversions

[Hans de Goede]

Hi Greg,

On 11-Aug-26 04:33, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 11, 2026 at 01:47:17AM +0100, Daniel Golle wrote:
>> Three in-tree drivers (iwlwifi, hci_h5, btintel_pcie) schedule a
>> deferred re-probe of their own device from a work item in module
>> text.
> 
> That's a mess, why?  Why not fix that up to not do that?  Thousands of
> other kernel drivers do not do that, what makes these so special?

I can only speak for the hci_h5 driver where I added the reprobe code-path.

The problem is some of the Bluetooth HCI devices using hci_h5 loose all
state during system-suspend. This means that the HCI and the Bluetooth core
end up being out of sync.

So we basically need to tear down and re-build everything including
e.g. the firmware upload which happens at probe(). Doing a full reprobe
is by far the easiest way to do this.

I suspect the other 4 users + the pending driver which triggered
this are similar.

Sure we can do the whole tear-down + setup from some worker
scheduled at resume, while keep the driver attached but if we need
to duplicate that over 4 drivers + the pending driver which triggers
this then IMHO those 5 users are a pattern which deserves having
some helper to do this through the existing probe() + remove(),
rather then requiring those 5 drivers to open code this themselves.

Note that we already have device_reprobe(), which has 15 existing
users. This series just adds a helper to do a device_reprobe() from
a worker in a safe way.

Regards,

Hans




> 
>> The hand-rolled copies share two bug classes: the work function
>> ends with module_put(THIS_MODULE),
> 
> That's broken as-is.  a module should NEVER be calling
> module_get(THIS_MODULE) either.
> 
>> racing a concurrent rmmod freeing
>> the module text (the race module_put_and_kthread_exit() exists to
>> close for kthreads), and nothing synchronizes the deferred detach
>> against device_shutdown() or an administrative unbind.
> 
> yeah, that's a mess, don't do that.
> 
> Fix up the original drivers please, let's not encourage others to copy
> this broken scheme.
> 
> Also, your patches were not threaded properly :(
> 
> thanks,
> 
> greg k-h