Missing releases and related

[lpisha]

Here is a summary of all the types in OWL, and their create / release / destroy functions.

Type	Create	Release	Destroy
OWLContext	owlContextCreate	N/A	owlContextDestroy
OWLBuffer	owlDeviceBufferCreate, owlHostPinnedBufferCreate, owlManagedMemoryBufferCreate, owlGraphicsBufferCreate	owlBufferRelease	owlBufferDestroy
OWLTexture	owlTexture2DCreate	*1	owlTexture2DDestroy
OWLGeom	owlGeomCreate	owlGeomRelease	N/A
OWLGeomType	owlGeomTypeCreate	Missing	N/A
OWLVariable	*2	owlVariableRelease	N/A
OWLModule	owlModuleCreate	owlModuleRelease	N/A
OWLGroup	owlUserGeomGroupCreate, owlTrianglesGeomGroupCreate, owlInstanceGroupCreate	owlGroupRelease	N/A
OWLRayGen	owlRayGenCreate	owlRayGenRelease	N/A
OWLMissProg	owlMissProgCreate	Missing	N/A
OWLParams, OWLLaunchParams, OWLGlobals	owlParamsCreate	Missing	N/A

owlGeomTypeRelease, owlMissProgRelease, and owlParamsRelease are missing.

*1: OWLBuffer has both a release and a destroy, but OWLTexture which is conceptually similar only has a destroy. This seems inconsistent?

*2: Probably created internally and returned through owlGeomGetVariable, owlRayGenGetVariable, owlMissProgGetVariable, and owlParamsGetVariable.

[ingowald]

re 2: Yes; variables never explicitly created, they get created by their 'parent' object when you call owlXysVariableGet; that said, a more consistent naming wold probably be owlXyzVariableCreateReference, because its actually a reference to a variable, and it actually does get 'created'. In that case I'd argue that'd cause more confusion than what it's worth, though, since most users would always go through owlXyzSet<..>(...), anyway.

Everything else: yes, fully agreed, should all be added for consistency.

[ingowald]

PS: just for completeness' sake: even objects that did not get properly released by the application code will get released/destroyed when the context itself gets destroyed, so the "memory leak" problm isn't just as big as the "can't even release them" may imply.

[lpisha]

I understand destroying the context releases them, however:

1. It should be possible to do any OWL operation in a loop indefinitely, and if there's no destroy/release then the loop would have to include creating and destroying the context.
2. OWL prints warnings about leaked objects on shutdown, including the types which are missing releases.