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authorStanislav Fomichev <sdf.kernel@gmail.com>2026-07-02 15:41:50 -0700
committerPaolo Abeni <pabeni@redhat.com>2026-07-07 15:31:37 +0200
commit538d89fd914610852a6fb20b823ba70566153d46 (patch)
treec28f46963c9a347daecd7335af0f6101d561c9d0 /Documentation
parentf540caaaca8d23a6bd3a8c424cd808037840b4af (diff)
downloadlinux-next-538d89fd914610852a6fb20b823ba70566153d46.tar.gz
linux-next-538d89fd914610852a6fb20b823ba70566153d46.zip
net: document NETDEV_UNREGISTER unlocked rationale
The lock-state table marks UNREGISTER as unlocked without saying why. Add a short note that many handlers release the lowers via dev_close(). Signed-off-by: Stanislav Fomichev <sdf@fomichev.me> Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260702224150.3730033-7-sdf@fomichev.me Signed-off-by: Paolo Abeni <pabeni@redhat.com>
Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation')
-rw-r--r--Documentation/networking/netdevices.rst5
1 files changed, 5 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/networking/netdevices.rst b/Documentation/networking/netdevices.rst
index 1bb68a73bb67..db71d4283032 100644
--- a/Documentation/networking/netdevices.rst
+++ b/Documentation/networking/netdevices.rst
@@ -427,6 +427,11 @@ running under the lock:
The following notifiers are running without the lock:
* ``NETDEV_UNREGISTER``
+Many SW devices (uppers) catch their lower's ``NETDEV_UNREGISTER``
+events and may interact with them via ``dev_*()`` handlers, which take
+the instance lock. Until we convert these devices to ``netif_*()`` variants,
+``NETDEV_UNREGISTER`` stays unlocked.
+
There are no clear expectations for the remaining notifiers. Notifiers not on
the list may run with or without the instance lock, potentially even invoking
the same notifier type with and without the lock from different code paths.