Re: [PATCH v2 1/4] driver core: Ignore 0 in dev_err_probe()

From: Dan Carpenter
Date: Mon Sep 02 2024 - 07:10:58 EST


On Mon, Sep 02, 2024 at 01:16:17PM +0300, Andy Shevchenko wrote:
> On Sat, Aug 31, 2024 at 11:53:51AM +0300, Dan Carpenter wrote:
> > On Sat, Aug 31, 2024 at 11:25:54AM +0300, Dan Carpenter wrote:
> > > On Thu, Aug 22, 2024 at 04:05:38PM +0300, Andy Shevchenko wrote:
> > > > In the similar way, ignore 0 error code (AKA "success") in
> > > > dev_err_probe(). This helps to simplify a code such as
> > > >
> > > > if (ret < 0)
> > > > return dev_err_probe(int3472->dev, ret, err_msg);
> > > >
> > > > return ret;
> > > >
> > > > to
> > > >
> > > > return dev_err_probe(int3472->dev, ret, err_msg);
> > > >
> > > > Reviewed-by: Ilpo Järvinen <ilpo.jarvinen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > > > Signed-off-by: Andy Shevchenko <andriy.shevchenko@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > >
> > > This is a terrible idea because currently Smatch is able to detect about one
> > > bug per month where someone unintentionally passes the wrong error variable
> > > to dev_err_probe().
>
> How many cases you know where smatch is false positive about this?
>

This check has a very low false positive rate. There is only one potential
false positive in the current linux-next. Let me add Baolin Wang to get his
take on this. I never mentioned reported this warning because the code was old
when I wrote the check.

drivers/spi/spi-sprd-adi.c
550 ret = of_hwspin_lock_get_id(np, 0);
551 if (ret > 0 || (IS_ENABLED(CONFIG_HWSPINLOCK) && ret == 0)) {

Is it possible for the CONFIG_ to not be enabled but ret is zero?

552 sadi->hwlock =
553 devm_hwspin_lock_request_specific(&pdev->dev, ret);
554 if (!sadi->hwlock) {
555 ret = -ENXIO;
556 goto put_ctlr;
557 }
558 } else {
559 switch (ret) {
560 case -ENOENT:
561 dev_info(&pdev->dev, "no hardware spinlock supplied\n");
562 break;
563 default:
564 dev_err_probe(&pdev->dev, ret, "failed to find hwlock id\n");
^^^

565 goto put_ctlr;
566 }
567 }


> I believe the number is only a few at most, which means that you may easily
> detect this still with this change being applied, i.e. "anything that
> terminates function flow with code 0, passed to dev_err_probe(), is
> suspicious".
>

I think you mean the opposite of what you wrote? That if we're passing zero to
dev_err_probe() and it's the last line in a function it's *NOT* suspicious?
Otherwise, I don't really understand the heuristic you're proposing.

regards,
dan carpenter