Re: [lm-sensors] [patch 1/5] hwmon: Convert fschmd to unlocked_ioctl

[Arnd Bergmann]

On Friday 06 November 2009, Jean Delvare wrote:
> I'm not sure why we need to hold the mutex here? My understanding is
> that watchdog_data_mutex protects watchdog_data_list and each
> watchdog's kref. And the above code doesn't touch either.
> 
> What I am more worried about is why ident is declared static. This
> looks like a bug to me. Instead of abusing watchdog_data_mutex to
> workaround this, I'd rather remove the "static". I guess that the
> current code happens to work because neither data->revision nor
> nowayout can change over time, but this looks needlessly fragile.
> 
> Hans, any comment?

The data copied into the watchdog_info data structure is completely
static. To make that clearer, I'd suggest moving it outside of
the ioctl function, and initializing it from fschmd_init.
Then it becomes obvious that the mutex is not needed to protect it.

	Arnd <><
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