Hi Linus,
Please, pull the following patches that replace zero-length arrays with
flexible-array members.
The current codebase makes use of the zero-length array language
extension to the C90 standard, but the preferred mechanism to declare
variable-length types such as these ones is a flexible array member[1][2],
introduced in C99:
struct foo {
int stuff;
struct boo array[];
};
By making use of the mechanism above, we will get a compiler warning
in case the flexible array does not occur last in the structure, which
will help us prevent some kind of undefined behavior bugs from being
inadvertently introduced[3] to the codebase from now on.
Also, notice that, dynamic memory allocations won't be affected by
this change:
"Flexible array members have incomplete type, and so the sizeof operator
may not be applied. As a quirk of the original implementation of
zero-length arrays, sizeof evaluates to zero."[1]
sizeof(flexible-array-member) triggers a warning because flexible array
members have incomplete type[1]. There are some instances of code in
which the sizeof operator is being incorrectly/erroneously applied to
zero-length arrays and the result is zero. Such instances may be hiding
some bugs. So, this work (flexible-array member convertions) will also
help to get completely rid of those sorts of issues.
Notice that all of these patches have been baking in linux-next for
quite a while now and, 238 more of these patches have already been
merged into 5.7-rc1.
There are a couple hundred more of these issues waiting to be addressed
in the whole codebase.
[1] https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc/Zero-Length.html
[2] https://github.com/KSPP/linux/issues/21
[3] commit 7649773293 ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")
Thanks
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Merge tag 'flexible-array-member-5.7-rc2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/gustavoars/linux
Pull flexible-array member conversion from Gustavo Silva:
"The current codebase makes use of the zero-length array language
extension to the C90 standard, but the preferred mechanism to declare
variable-length types such as these ones is a flexible array
member[1][2], introduced in C99:
struct foo {
int stuff;
struct boo array[];
};
By making use of the mechanism above, we will get a compiler warning
in case the flexible array does not occur last in the structure, which
will help us prevent some kind of undefined behavior bugs from being
inadvertently introduced[3] to the codebase from now on.
Also, notice that, dynamic memory allocations won't be affected by
this change:
"Flexible array members have incomplete type, and so the sizeof
operator may not be applied. As a quirk of the original
implementation of zero-length arrays, sizeof evaluates to zero."[1]
sizeof(flexible-array-member) triggers a warning because flexible
array members have incomplete type[1]. There are some instances of
code in which the sizeof operator is being incorrectly/erroneously
applied to zero-length arrays and the result is zero. Such instances
may be hiding some bugs. So, this work (flexible-array member
convertions) will also help to get completely rid of those sorts of
issues.
Notice that all of these patches have been baking in linux-next for
quite a while now and, 238 more of these patches have already been
merged into 5.7-rc1.
There are a couple hundred more of these issues waiting to be
addressed in the whole codebase"
[1] https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc/Zero-Length.html
[2] https://github.com/KSPP/linux/issues/21
[3] commit 7649773293 ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")
* tag 'flexible-array-member-5.7-rc2' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/gustavoars/linux: (28 commits)
xattr.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
uapi: linux: fiemap.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
uapi: linux: dlm_device.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
tpm_eventlog.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
ti_wilink_st.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
swap.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
skbuff.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
sched: topology.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
rslib.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
rio.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
posix_acl.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
platform_data: wilco-ec.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
memcontrol.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
list_lru.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
lib: cpu_rmap: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
irq.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
ihex.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
igmp.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
genalloc.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
ethtool.h: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member
...
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