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NFC: digital: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member

PATCH Applied Gustavo A. R. Silva 2 participants 2 messages Feb 17, 2020 – Feb 18, 2020

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PATCH 1/1 NFC: digital: Replace zero-length array with flexible-array member

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]

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 76497732932f ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")

---
 net/nfc/digital_dep.c | 4 ++--
 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
net/nfc/digital_dep.c +2 -2
index 65aaa9d7c813..304b1a9bb18a 100644
@@ -71,7 +71,7 @@ struct digital_atr_req {
 	u8 bs;
 	u8 br;
 	u8 pp;
-	u8 gb[0];
+	u8 gb[];
 } __packed;
 
 struct digital_atr_res {
@@ -83,7 +83,7 @@ struct digital_atr_res {
 	u8 br;
 	u8 to;
 	u8 pp;
-	u8 gb[0];
+	u8 gb[];
 } __packed;
 
 struct digital_psl_req {
Signature · 1 line
2.25.0
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#1 lore raw

From: "Gustavo A. R. Silva" <[email protected]>
Date: Mon, 17 Feb 2020 13:59:41 -0600

Quoted 22 lines

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]

Quoted 7 lines

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 76497732932f ("cxgb3/l2t: Fix undefined behaviour")

Applied.