Re: [PATCH] doc: add note on usleep_range range

[Joe Perches]

On Wed, 2016-12-14 at 00:37 +0000, Nicholas Mc Guire wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 13, 2016 at 04:27:32PM -0800, Joe Perches wrote:
> > a, On Tue, 2016-12-13 at 09:19 +0000, Nicholas Mc Guire wrote:
> > > On Tue, Dec 13, 2016 at 11:10:50AM +0200, Jani Nikula wrote:
> > > > On Tue, 13 Dec 2016, Nicholas Mc Guire <hofrat@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> > > > > useleep_range() with a delta of 0 makes no sense and only prevents the
> > > > > timer subsystem from optimizing interrupts. As any user of usleep_range()
> > > > > is in non-atomic context the timer jitter is in the range of 10s of 
> > > > > microseconds anyway.
> > > > > 
> > > > > This adds a note making it clear that a range of 0 is a bad idea.
> > > > 
> > > > So I don't really have anything to do with the timer subsystem, I'm just
> > > > their "consumer", so take this with a grain of salt.
> > > > 
> > > > Documentation is good, but I don't think this will be enough.
> > > > 
> > > > I think the only thing that will work is to detect and complain about
> > > > things like this automatically. Some ideas:
> > > > 
> > > > * WARN_ON(min == max) or WARN_ON_ONCE(min == max) in usleep_range()
> > > >   might be drastic, but it would get the job done eventually.
> > > > 
> > > > * If you want to avoid the runtime overhead (and complaints about the
> > > >   backtraces), you could wrap usleep_range() in a macro that does
> > > >   BUILD_BUG_ON(min == max) if the parameters are build time constants
> > > >   (they usually are). But you'd have to fix all the problem cases first.
> > > > 
> > > > * You could try (to persuade Julia or Dan) to come up with a
> > > >   cocci/smatch check for usleep_range() calls where min == max, so we
> > > >   could get bug reports for this. This probably works on expressions, so
> > > >   this would catch also cases where the parameters aren't built timea,
> > > >   constants.
> > 
> > You could also add a macro for usleep_range like
> > 
> > #define usleep_range(a, b) \
> > ({ \
> > 	if (__builtin_constant_p(a) && __builtin_constant_p(b)) { \
> > 		if (a == b) \
> > 			__compiletime_warning("Better to use usleep_range with different values"); \
> > 		else if (a > b) \
> > 			__compiletime_error("usleep_range uses smaller value first"); \
> > 	} \
> > 	usleep_range(a, b); \
> > })
> > 
> 
> thanks for that "template" 
>  
> > and add parentheses around the actual function
> > definition for usleep_range in kernel/time/timer.c
> > so the macro works and these messages get emitted
> > at compile-time.
> > 
> 
> while compiletime warnings are a way to go I think that an
> external tool is more effective than anoying eveyone during
> build

I don't.

Annoying people at build-time is probably _the single most_
effective way to get source code defects fixed.