Re: [PATCH v4 43/45] namei: initialize parameters passed to step_into()

Segher Boessenkool
2022-07-04T18:39:17Z

On Mon, Jul 04, 2022 at 05:49:13PM +0200, Alexander Potapenko wrote:
> One of the reasons to do so is standard compliance - passing an
> uninitialized value to a function is UB in C11, as Segher pointed out
> here: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-toolchains/20220614214039.GA25951@gate.crashing.org/
> The compilers may not be smart enough to take advantage of this _yet_,
> but I wouldn't underestimate their ability to evolve (especially that
> of Clang).

GCC doesn't currently detect this UB, and doesn't even warn or error for
this, although that shouldn't be hard to do: it is all completely local.
An error is warranted here, and you won't get UB ever either then.

> I also believe it's fragile to rely on the callee to ignore certain
> parameters: it may be doing so today, but if someone changes
> step_into() tomorrow we may miss it.

There isn't any choice usually, this is C, do you want varargs? :-)

But yes, you always should only pass "safe" values; callers should do
their part, and not assume the callee will do in the future as it does
now. Defensive programming is mostly about defending your own sanity!

Segher