Re: [PATCH v2] ALSA: pcm: Unlink substreams before releasing them

[Takashi Iwai]

On Wed, 14 Oct 2026 12:52:15 +0200,
Cen Zhang wrote:
> 
> A closing PCM substream can remain in its linked group after the
> driver close callback has freed its private data. With two configured
> dummy capture substreams on the same PCM device, linked with LINK,
> PREPARE on the surviving substream can still visit the closing member:
> 
>   Final close of A                   PREPARE on linked B
>   ----------------                   -------------------
>   snd_pcm_drop(): group -> SETUP
>   do_hw_free(A)
>   dummy_pcm_close(A): free dpcm
>                                      Take snd_pcm_link_rwsem for reading
>                                      Walk the group, including A
>                                      dummy_pcm_prepare(A)
>                                        Read freed timer_ops
>   pcm_release_private(A)
>     snd_pcm_unlink(A)
> 
> Unlink at the start of final substream release, before dropping the
> stream or releasing driver resources. The link write lock waits for
> an existing group PREPARE, and unlink removes the closing member from
> later group actions. Keep the existing stop synchronization in
> do_hw_free() before the driver resources are freed.
> 
> Make unlink independent of the pcm_release callback so OSS substreams
> are covered too. Remove the native-only unlink callback and its
> registration, while retaining the callback hook for OSS cleanup.
> 
> The existing KASAN report below records the freed timer_ops read in
> dummy_pcm_prepare().
> 
> KASAN report as below:
> 
>     BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in dummy_pcm_prepare+0xb7/0xc0
>     Read of size 8 at addr ffff888106b35f00 by task alsa_pcm_fixtur/491
> 
>     Call Trace:
>      <TASK>
>      dump_stack_lvl+0x93/0xd0
>      print_report+0xce/0x630
>      ? dummy_pcm_prepare+0xb7/0xc0
>      ? srso_alias_return_thunk+0x5/0xfbef5
>      ? __virt_addr_valid+0x20d/0x410
>      ? dummy_pcm_prepare+0xb7/0xc0
>      kasan_report+0xe0/0x110
>      ? dummy_pcm_prepare+0xb7/0xc0
>      dummy_pcm_prepare+0xb7/0xc0
>      snd_pcm_do_prepare+0x71/0xb0
>      snd_pcm_action_group+0x505/0xb30
>      snd_pcm_action_nonatomic+0xab/0x150
>      snd_pcm_common_ioctl+0x1bf5/0x3a50
>      ? srso_alias_return_thunk+0x5/0xfbef5
>      ? do_vfs_ioctl+0x1f5/0x1280
>      ? __pfx_do_vfs_ioctl+0x10/0x10
>      ? ioctl_has_perm.constprop.0.isra.0+0x34f/0x500
>      ? __pfx_snd_pcm_common_ioctl+0x10/0x10
>      ? __fput+0x5ba/0xa60
>      ? srso_alias_return_thunk+0x5/0xfbef5
>      snd_pcm_ioctl+0x76/0xb0
>      ? __pfx_snd_pcm_ioctl+0x10/0x10
>      __x64_sys_ioctl+0x163/0x1d0
>      do_syscall_64+0x115/0x6a0
>      entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f
>     RIP: 0033:0x41ee8d
>     Code: 04 25 28 00 00 00 48 89 45 c8 31 c0 48 8d 45 10 c7 45 b0 10 00 00 00 48 89 45 b8 48 8d 45 d0 48 89 45 c0 b8 10 00 00 00 0f 05 <89> c2 3d 00 f0 ff ff 77 1a 48 8b 45 c8 64 48 2b 04 25 28 00 00 00
>     RSP: 002b:00007ffcfa72fb60 EFLAGS: 00000246 ORIG_RAX: 0000000000000010
>     RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 0000000000000004 RCX: 000000000041ee8d
>     RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000004140 RDI: 0000000000000004
>     RBP: 00007ffcfa72fbb0 R08: 00007ffcfa72fb98 R09: 0000000000000110
>     R10: 0000000000000001 R11: 0000000000000246 R12: 00007ffcfa72fcd8
>     R13: 00007ffcfa72fcf0 R14: 00000000004a8f28 R15: 0000000000000001
>      </TASK>
> 
>     Allocated by task 488:
>      kasan_save_stack+0x33/0x60
>      kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30
>      __kasan_kmalloc+0xaa/0xb0
>      __kmalloc_cache_noprof+0x251/0x610
>      dummy_hrtimer_create+0x4a/0x170
>      dummy_pcm_open+0xe7/0x730
>      snd_pcm_open_substream+0x926/0x1580
>      snd_pcm_open+0x28d/0x6d0
>      snd_pcm_capture_open+0x82/0xe0
>      snd_open+0x1ec/0x3e0
>      chrdev_open+0x21f/0x660
>      do_dentry_open+0x5c8/0x1300
>      vfs_open+0x87/0x390
>      path_openat+0x2460/0x3cd0
>      do_file_open+0x21e/0x470
>      do_sys_openat2+0xf4/0x1b0
>      __x64_sys_openat+0x136/0x1e0
>      do_syscall_64+0x115/0x6a0
>      entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f
> 
>     Freed by task 490:
>      kasan_save_stack+0x33/0x60
>      kasan_save_track+0x14/0x30
>      kasan_save_free_info+0x3b/0x60
>      __kasan_slab_free+0x5f/0x80
>      kfree+0x307/0x580
>      dummy_hrtimer_free+0x72/0xe0
>      dummy_pcm_close+0x9f/0xd0
>      snd_pcm_release_substream.part.0+0x104/0x310
>      snd_pcm_release+0x106/0x240
>      __fput+0x39f/0xa60
>      fput_close_sync+0xff/0x200
>      __x64_sys_close+0x8c/0xf0
>      do_syscall_64+0x115/0x6a0
>      entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f
>     ==================================================================
> 
> Fixes: 1576274d3028 ("[ALSA] Fix Oops of PCM OSS emulation")
> Suggested-by: Takashi Iwai <tiwai@xxxxxxx>
> Signed-off-by: Cen Zhang <zzzccc427@xxxxxxxxx>

Applied to for-next branch now.

A problem with racy link removal Sashiko suggested is an interesting
case to be revisited, but it's no regression and can be triggered
independently from this change.


Takashi