linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH v2] wifi: p54: Fix memory leak in p54_beacon

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Message-Id: <20260122083423.408425-1-zilin@seu.edu.cn>
Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2026 08:34:23 +0000
From: Zilin Guan <zilin@....edu.cn>
To: chunkeey@...il.com
Cc: jianhao.xu@....edu.cn,
	johannes.berg@...el.com,
	johannes@...solutions.net,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	linux-wireless@...r.kernel.org,
	quic_rdevanat@...cinc.com,
	zilin@....edu.cn
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2] wifi: p54: Fix memory leak in p54_beacon_update()

On Thu, Jan 22, 2026 at 09:14:50AM +0100, Christian Lamparter wrote:
> Hi Zilin,
> 
> On 1/21/26 10:05 AM, Zilin Guan wrote:
> > On Tue, Jan 20, 2026 at 09:25:15PM +0100, Christian Lamparter wrote:
> >> Ok, from what I remember, this return basically is/was and likely will be a dead-code path.
> >> So adding something there is only there to "look" good for the static analysis tools.
> >> But many commits like these have been merged before. As long as it is mentioned that
> >> static analysis was the reason for this. Yeah sure why not.
> >>
> >>
> >> Reason being why this is dead-code is that in order for the path to trigger, mac80211's
> >> ieee80211_beacon_get must have prepared an invalid beacon (with an invalid TIM Element)
> >> to start with... And looking at ieee80211_beacon_add_tim_pvb, it still looks to me like
> >> the IE length can't be less than 3 ever. But, I've been wrong before, if you do see please
> >> correct me. (If not, you don't neet to really bother with the Fixes-Tag)
> > 
> > I agree with your analysis. I checked the code and confirmed that mac80211
> > guarantees a minimum TIM length of 4 bytes for non-S1G devices.
> > 
> > I appreciate you accepting this patch to silence the static analysis warning.
> 
> Phew, and so far no buildbot replied with comments.
> 
> I have one last request: Can you please add a sentence about that analysis into the commit log as well?
> Our future selves could maybe appreciate that one day, if this comes up again. Because then we won't have
> to remember all or search/look for it again, if it's already neatly written down directly there.
> 
> Thank you,
> Christian

Hi Christian,

Sure, I will add a note about the analysis to the commit message as 
requested and send a v3 patch shortly.

Thanks,
Zilin