From: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im>
To: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Cc: git@vger.kernel.org, Harald Nordgren <haraldnordgren@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH 1/4] remote: return non-const pointer from error_buf()
Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2026 07:33:58 +0100 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <aW3QVkpPPHjKVNLC@pks.im> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20260119051945.GA1991523@coredump.intra.peff.net>
On Mon, Jan 19, 2026 at 12:19:45AM -0500, Jeff King wrote:
> We have an error_buf() helper that functions a bit like our error()
> helper, but returns NULL instead of -1. Its return type is "const char
> *", but this is overly restrictive. If we use the helper in a function
> that returns non-const "char *", the compiler will complain about
> the implicit cast from const to non-const.
>
> Meanwhile, the const in the helper is doing nothing useful, as it only
> ever returns NULL. Let's drop the const, which will let us use it in
> both types of function.
This function signature is indeed quite misleading, and I'd argue that
it continues to be so even after the change. I guess the intent is to
make it a bit easier to print an error in functions that return a
string.
I'm not really a huge fan of this, but it's not a fault of this patch
series, so let's read on.
Patrick
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2026-01-19 6:34 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 15+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2026-01-19 5:18 [PATCH 0/4] memory leaks in remote.c Jeff King
2026-01-19 5:19 ` [PATCH 1/4] remote: return non-const pointer from error_buf() Jeff King
2026-01-19 6:33 ` Patrick Steinhardt [this message]
2026-01-20 0:28 ` Junio C Hamano
2026-01-20 19:38 ` Jeff King
2026-01-20 20:18 ` Junio C Hamano
2026-01-19 5:20 ` [PATCH 2/4] remote: drop const return of tracking_for_push_dest() Jeff King
2026-01-19 6:34 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2026-01-19 5:22 ` [PATCH 3/4] remote: fix leak in branch_get_push_1() with invalid "simple" config Jeff King
2026-01-19 6:34 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2026-01-19 5:23 ` [PATCH 4/4] remote: always allocate branch.push_tracking_ref Jeff King
2026-01-19 6:34 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2026-01-19 15:04 ` Triangular workflow Harald Nordgren
2026-01-20 19:40 ` Jeff King
2026-01-20 0:31 ` [PATCH 0/4] memory leaks in remote.c Junio C Hamano
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