Review Request JDK-8164512: Replace ClassLoader use of finalizer with phantom reference to unload native library

[mandy chung]

On 9/25/17 11:37 PM, Kim Barrett wrote:
> Thanks for dealing with this.

I'm all for eliminating the finalizers in the JDK.  Looking forward to 
having a finalizer-free JDK.
> ==============================================================================
> src/java.base/share/native/libjava/ClassLoader.c
>   415 Java_java_lang_ClassLoader_00024NativeLibrary_00024Unloader_unload
>   416 (JNIEnv *env, jobject this, jstring name, jboolean isBuiltin, jlong address)
>
> With this change, the "this" argument is no longer used.
>
> Because of this, the native function could be a static member function
> of the new Unloader class, or could (I think) still be a (now static)
> member function of NativeLibrary.  The latter would not require a name
> change, only a signature change.  But I don't really care which class
> has the method.
Yes it can be a static method.
> ==============================================================================
> src/java.base/share/classes/java/lang/ClassLoader.java
> 2394         public void register() {
>                   [...]
> 2406                 // register the class loader for cleanup when unloaded
> 2407                 if (loader != getBuiltinPlatformClassLoader() &&
> 2408                     loader != getBuiltinAppClassLoader()) {
> 2409                     CleanerFactory.cleaner()
> 2410                         .register(loader, new Unloader(name, handle, isBuiltin));
> 2411                 }
>
> Can anything before the cleanup registration throw?

No within the register method.  The builtin loaders are created early 
during startup.  I shall make sure that System::loadLibrary is not 
called during init phase 1.
> If so, do we leak
> because we haven't registered the cleanup yet?  And what if the
> registration itself fails to complete?

If Cleaner::register fails, it should throw an exception. Otherwise, the 
registration should complete.
> ==============================================================================
> src/hotspot/share/prims/jni.cpp
>   405     // Special handling to make sure JNI_OnLoad are executed in the correct class context.
>
> s/are executed/is executed/
>
Will fix it.

I'm considering to separate the JNI_FindClass change to target 18.3 and 
provide a flag to restore the current behavior so that it may help 
existing code to identify its dependency on the current behavior and 
give time to migrate.  Then target the finalizer to Cleaner change in 18.9.

It's unknown to us how many existing native libraries are impacted by 
this change (calling FindClass from JNI_OnUnload to load classes visible 
the class loader being unloaded).   I suspect it's rare. If FindClass is 
called when the native library is being unloaded and fail to find the 
class due to this change, it is not hard to find out but the code might 
crash if it does not handle the class not found case properly.

Any opinion?

Mandy