Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86)

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To: Al Viro <viro@...>
Cc: Randy Dunlap <randy.dunlap@...>, Stephen Rothwell <sfr@...>, mingo <mingo@...>, tglx <tglx@...>, <linux-next@...>, LKML <linux-kernel@...>
Date: Monday, April 14, 2008 - 4:34 am

* Al Viro <viro@ZenIV.linux.org.uk> wrote:


... but reality called in and gcc added printf format checks as a gcc 
extension and even modifies the code to make it safe when the user gets 
it "wrong".

why? Because vararg is a dangerous concept as specified and strong but 
meaningful type checking should be enforced across such places. And our 
goal is to build better software and avoid bugs that can be avoided, not 
to follow standards where they are _stupid_.


sure. I dont actually care that much how it's solved - via extending the 
concept of varargs or via working it around where it hurts most. What 
matters is that the current situation is suboptimal. The present 
"solution" uglifies the code and more ugly code is always more 
dangerous.

But it's even worse: bogus warnings also reduce the psychological 
threshold to adding stupid casts - if you have to add casts in a printk 
that looks senseless then why not circumvent _other_ warnings that look 
senseless?

Excessive false positives are actively harmful to software quality 
because they teach people to ignore warnings.

	Ingo
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Messages in current thread:
linux-next: Tree for April 10, Stephen Rothwell, (Thu Apr 10, 4:14 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Randy Dunlap, (Thu Apr 10, 6:09 pm)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Ingo Molnar, (Fri Apr 11, 3:46 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Randy Dunlap, (Fri Apr 11, 11:19 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Jakub Jelinek, (Mon Apr 14, 4:40 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Randy Dunlap, (Mon Apr 14, 6:28 pm)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Al Viro, (Fri Apr 11, 11:26 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Ingo Molnar, (Mon Apr 14, 4:12 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Al Viro, (Mon Apr 14, 4:22 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Ingo Molnar, (Mon Apr 14, 4:34 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Jakub Jelinek, (Mon Apr 14, 4:43 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), Al Viro, (Mon Apr 14, 5:30 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (arch/x86), David Miller, (Mon Apr 14, 5:37 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10 (ftrace), Randy Dunlap, (Thu Apr 10, 6:07 pm)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10: generic pci_enable_resour..., Mariusz Kozlowski, (Thu Apr 10, 3:34 pm)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10: generic pci_enable_resour..., Stephen Rothwell, (Mon Apr 14, 12:49 am)
[BUG] linux-next: April 10 - kernel oops at kmem_cache_all..., Kamalesh Babulal, (Thu Apr 10, 2:07 pm)
Re: [BUG] linux-next: April 10 - kernel oops at kmem_cache..., Kamalesh Babulal, (Mon Apr 14, 9:14 am)
Re: linux-next: Tree for April 10, Greg KH, (Thu Apr 10, 1:42 pm)
Re: [BUG] linux-next: Tree for April 10 - kernel panic while..., Bartlomiej Zolnierkiewicz..., (Thu Apr 10, 8:03 am)
Re: [BUG] linux-next: Tree for April 10 - kernel panic while..., Bartlomiej Zolnierkiewicz..., (Thu Apr 10, 1:14 pm)
Re: [BUG] linux-next: Tree for April 10 - kernel panic while..., Bartlomiej Zolnierkiewicz..., (Thu Apr 10, 3:16 pm)