stat(2) does not indicate behavior with NULL filename arg, man pages 3.24

stat(2) does not indicate behavior with NULL filename arg, man pages 3.24

[Jeff Mahovsky]

The stat(2) manpage does not indicate the behavior of the stat() 
function when the filename is a NULL pointer.  Does stat() return an 
error or is the behavior undefined?

Jeff Mahovsky
Dreamworks Animation

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Re: stat(2) does not indicate behavior with NULL filename arg, man pages 3.24

[Petr Baudis]

On Wed, Apr 21, 2010 at 12:00:10PM -0700, Jeff Mahovsky wrote:
> The stat(2) manpage does not indicate the behavior of the stat()
> function when the filename is a NULL pointer.  Does stat() return an
> error or is the behavior undefined?

I think it is generally not safe to rely on proper handling of such NULL
pointers unless it is explicitly specified that they are handled
correctly. I think e.g. glibc will happily peek at the stat()'s filename
if you compile with -fbounded-pointers.

-- 
				Petr "Pasky" Baudis
When I feel like exercising, I just lie down until the feeling
goes away.  -- xed_over
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Re: stat(2) does not indicate behavior with NULL filename arg, man pages 3.24

[Michael Kerrisk]

Jeff

On Wed, Apr 21, 2010 at 9:00 PM, Jeff Mahovsky
<Jeff.Mahovsky-hCDZnVt6e3JSwrhanM7KvQ@public.gmane.org> wrote:
> The stat(2) manpage does not indicate the behavior of the stat() function
> when the filename is a NULL pointer.  Does stat() return an error or is the
> behavior undefined?
>
> Jeff Mahovsky
> Dreamworks Animation

Just to add to what Petr said. A NULL pointer is a general kind of
error that can affect many interfaces. I don't really see a need to
document this case for a specific interface.

Thanks,

Michael


-- 
Michael Kerrisk
Linux man-pages maintainer; http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/
Author of "The Linux Programming Interface" http://blog.man7.org/
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