Re: [PATCH V2] sparse: Allow override of sizeof(bool) warning

Ben Pfaff
2014-02-27T04:26:42Z

On Wed, Feb 26, 2014 at 08:19:57PM -0800, H. Peter Anvin wrote:
> On 02/26/2014 08:00 PM, Ben Pfaff wrote:
> >
> > The commit *relaxed* sparse behavior: because previously sizeof(bool)
> > was an error. I'm not in favor of any diagnostic at all for
> > sizeof(bool), but my recollection is that a sparse maintainer wanted it
> > to yield one.
>
> Still not clear as to why.

The discussion is here:
http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.parsers.sparse/2462

Quoting from that discussion, the core of Christopher Li's argument was
this:
> On Mon, May 9, 2011 at 1:02 PM, Ben Pfaff <blp <at> nicira.com> wrote:
> > Thank you for applying my patch. It does work for me, in the sense
> > that I get a warning instead of an error now, but I'm not so happy to
> > get any diagnostic at all. Is there some reason why sizeof(_Bool)
> > warrants a warning when, say, sizeof(long) does not? After all, both
> > sizes are implementation defined.

> Because sizeof(_Bool) is a little bit special compare to sizeof(long).
> In the case of long, all sizeof(long) * 8 bits are use in the actual value.
> But for the _Bool, only the 1 bit is used in the 8 bits size. In other words,
> the _Bool has a special case of the actual bit size is not a multiple of 8.

> Sparse has two hats, it is a C compiler front end, and more often it is
> used in the Linux kernel source sanitize checking. Depending on the sizeof
> _Bool sounds a little bit suspicious in the kernel. I would love to the heard
> your actual usage case of the sizeof(_Bool). Why do you care about this
> warning?