Re: [PATCH 2/5] Make relpathbackend return a statically result instead of palloc()'ing it

On 2013-01-08 14:28:14 -0500, Tom Lane wrote:
> Andres Freund <andres@2ndquadrant.com> writes:
> maxpg> From: Andres Freund <andres@anarazel.de>
> > relpathbackend() (via some of its wrappers) is used in *_desc routines which we
> > want to be useable without a backend environment arround.
>
> I'm 100% unimpressed with making relpathbackend return a pointer to a
> static buffer.  Who's to say whether that won't create bugs due to
> overlapping usages?

I say it ;). I've gone through all callers and checked. Not that that
guarantees anything, but ...

The reason a static buffer is better is that some of the *desc routines
use relpathbackend() and pfree() the result. That would require
providing a stub pfree() in xlogdump which seems to be exceedingly ugly.

> > Change signature to return a 'const char *' to make misuse easier to
> > detect.
>
> That seems to create way more churn than is necessary, and it's wrong
> anyway if the result is palloc'd.

It causes warnings in potential external users that pfree() the result
of relpathbackend which seems helpful. Obviously only makes sense if
relpathbackend() returns a pointer into a static buffer...

Greetings,

Andres Freund

--Andres Freund                       http://www.2ndQuadrant.com/PostgreSQL Development, 24x7 Support, Training &
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