Re: [PATCH] staging: octeon: release the port device node in cvm_oct_probe

[Dan Carpenter <error27@gmail.com>]

On Wed, Nov 04, 2026 at 02:14:50AM +0000, Wentao Liang wrote:
> cvm_oct_probe() looks up the device node of every port with
> cvm_oct_node_for_port(), which walks the children with
> for_each_child_of_node() and therefore returns the node with an
> incremented reference count.  The reference is stored in
> priv->of_node and used for the lifetime of the net_device, but it is
> never dropped: both probe error paths free the net_device without
> releasing the node, and cvm_oct_remove_device() does the same on
> unbind.  Each failed or torn down port therefore keeps its device node
> referenced forever.
> 
> Add the missing of_node_put() in the two probe error paths and in
> cvm_oct_remove_device(), which also covers the error cleanup done after
> the ports have been registered.  of_node_put() accepts the NULL node of
> the POW device.
> 
> Fixes: 422d97b8b05e ("Revert "staging: octeon: delete driver"")
> Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
> Assisted-by: DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash and OpenAI Codex
> Signed-off-by: Wentao Liang <vulab@iscas.ac.cn>

Normally with firmware, we just take a reference to the firmware node,
read the information we need to probe, and then release the reference.

Is there any need to hold the reference here until basically the system
shuts down?

regards,
dan carpenter