[PATCH] checkpatch: Fix bad COMPLEX_MACRO on asm volatile

From: Pierre-Clément Tosi

Date: Sat Nov 07 2026 - 12:49:39 EST


Commit 42e152931deb ("checkpatch: exclude asm volatile from complex macro
check") added a substitution converting "asm volatile" into "asm_volatile"
so that macros expanding to an asm volatile statement would be treated like
a single function call and excluded from the COMPLEX_MACRO error ("Macros
with complex values should be enclosed in parentheses").

However, that substitution was placed after the loop that flattens
parenthesized expressions into "1u" (originally "1"). For a macro without
whitespace between "volatile" and "(", such as:

#define foo(x) asm volatile("..." : : "r" (x))

flattening the parenthesized argument list first turns the statement into
"asm volatile1u". Because "1u" starts with a word character, the trailing
word boundary (\b) in /\b_*asm_*\s+_*volatile_*\b/ no longer matches after
"volatile", leaving the space between "asm" and "volatile1u" intact and
causing the macro to still fail the single-lvalue check and trigger a
false-positive COMPLEX_MACRO error.

Move the "asm volatile" to "asm_volatile" substitution before the
parenthesis-flattening loop so that "asm volatile(...)" is first rewritten
to "asm_volatile(...)" and then flattened to "asm_volatile1u" as intended.

Fixes: 42e152931deb ("checkpatch: exclude asm volatile from complex macro check")
Signed-off-by: Pierre-Clément Tosi <ptosi@xxxxxxxxxx>
---
scripts/checkpatch.pl | 6 +++---
1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)

diff --git a/scripts/checkpatch.pl b/scripts/checkpatch.pl
index b8b64f720191..5319a8ecec50 100755
--- a/scripts/checkpatch.pl
+++ b/scripts/checkpatch.pl
@@ -6050,6 +6050,9 @@ sub process {
$dstat =~ s/^\s*//s;
$dstat =~ s/\s*$//s;

+ # Make asm volatile uses seem like a generic function
+ $dstat =~ s/\b_*asm_*\s+_*volatile_*\b/asm_volatile/g;
+
# Flatten any parentheses and braces
while ($dstat =~ s/\([^\(\)]*\)/1u/ ||
$dstat =~ s/\{[^\{\}]*\}/1u/ ||
@@ -6063,9 +6066,6 @@ sub process {
{
}

- # Make asm volatile uses seem like a generic function
- $dstat =~ s/\b_*asm_*\s+_*volatile_*\b/asm_volatile/g;
-
my $exceptions = qr{
$Declare|
# named exceptions

---
base-commit: 6628e7d4c6b25c8d18f1345e3a20d21829aae7e4
change-id: 20261107-checkpatch-asm-complex_macro-75ee815da528

Best regards,
--
Pierre-Clément Tosi <ptosi@xxxxxxxxxx>