[PATCH] pinctrl: sirf/atlas7: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member

[PATCH] pinctrl: sirf/atlas7: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member

[Gustavo A. R. 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]

This issue was found with the help of Coccinelle.

[1] https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc/Zero-Length.html
[2] https://github.com/KSPP/linux/issues/21
[3] commit 76497732932f ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")

Signed-off-by: Gustavo A. R. Silva <gustavo@embeddedor.com>
---
 drivers/pinctrl/sirf/pinctrl-atlas7.c | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/drivers/pinctrl/sirf/pinctrl-atlas7.c b/drivers/pinctrl/sirf/pinctrl-atlas7.c
index b1a9611f46b3..50df9e084414 100644
--- a/drivers/pinctrl/sirf/pinctrl-atlas7.c
+++ b/drivers/pinctrl/sirf/pinctrl-atlas7.c
@@ -352,7 +352,7 @@ struct atlas7_gpio_chip {
 	int nbank;
 	raw_spinlock_t lock;
 	struct gpio_chip chip;
-	struct atlas7_gpio_bank banks[0];
+	struct atlas7_gpio_bank banks[];
 };
 
 /**
-- 
2.25.0

Re: [PATCH] pinctrl: sirf/atlas7: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member

[Linus Walleij]

On Thu, Feb 27, 2020 at 7:55 PM Gustavo A. R. Silva
<gustavo@embeddedor.com> wrote:

> 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]
>
> This issue was found with the help of Coccinelle.
>
> [1] https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc/Zero-Length.html
> [2] https://github.com/KSPP/linux/issues/21
> [3] commit 76497732932f ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")
>
> Signed-off-by: Gustavo A. R. Silva <gustavo@embeddedor.com>

Patch applied!

Yours,
Linus Walleij