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tools/testing: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array
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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]

sizeof(flexible-array-member) triggers a warning because flexible array
members have incomplete type[1]. There are some instances of code in
which the sizeof operator is being incorrectly/erroneously applied to
zero-length arrays and the result is zero. Such instances may be hiding
some bugs. So, this work (flexible-array member conversions) will also
help to get completely rid of those sorts of issues.

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 7649773 ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")

Signed-off-by: Gustavo A. R. Silva <gustavoars@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Shuah Khan <skhan@linuxfoundation.org>
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Gustavo A. R. Silva authored and Shuah Khan committed May 8, 2020
1 parent 4bb9d46 commit d8238f9
Showing 1 changed file with 1 addition and 1 deletion.
2 changes: 1 addition & 1 deletion tools/testing/selftests/nsfs/pidns.c
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -27,7 +27,7 @@
#define __stack_aligned__ __attribute__((aligned(16)))
struct cr_clone_arg {
char stack[128] __stack_aligned__;
char stack_ptr[0];
char stack_ptr[];
};

static int child(void *args)
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