Re: [Qemu-devel] [PATCH] error: Remove NULL checks on error_propagate() calls

[Eduardo Habkost <ehabkost@redhat.com>]

On Thu, Jun 09, 2016 at 02:11:23PM -0600, Eric Blake wrote:
> On 06/09/2016 01:50 PM, Eduardo Habkost wrote:
> > On Thu, Jun 09, 2016 at 01:37:23PM -0600, Eric Blake wrote:
> > [...]
> >>
> >> Hmm - it seems like in most of the cases where the ONLY thing done in
> >> the if (local_err) block is to propagate the error, we should instead be
> >> directly assigning to errp instead of wasting a local variable.  At this
> >> point, my review is repetitive enough that I'll stop looking, and leave
> >> it up to you and Markus whether to attempt a more ambitious Coccinelle
> >> script.
> > 
> > If it happens immediately before the function end or a return
> > statement it should be easy, but it would still require some
> > manual work to remove the unused variable declaration. Probably
> > easier to do that in a follow-up patch.
> 
> I think Coccinelle can be used to eliminate unused local variables, but
> don't know the recipe off-hand; maybe a web search will turn up something?

I found something called "when constraints", but the
documentation isn't very clear.

There's an example here:
http://coccinelle.lip6.fr/rules/unused.cocci

> 
> > 
> > It's harder (impossible?) to make Coccinelle avoid matching if
> > local_err is used somewhere else in the function. But it's
> > probably doable with some manual work, in a follow-up patch.
> 
> I don't know - Coccinelle is rather powerful, and there may indeed be a
> way to flag conditions for a variable that is not used anywhere except
> in the lines mentioned in the recipe, vs. a variable that can also be
> used in the ... portion of the recipe.

I found a hackish way to do that. Sending a follow-up patch in 1
minute.

-- 
Eduardo