linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH v5 02/36] compiler-context-analysis: Add infrastructure for Context Analysis with Clang

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Message-ID: <2f0c27eb-eca5-4a7f-8035-71c6b0c84e30@acm.org>
Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2025 11:04:49 -0800
From: Bart Van Assche <bvanassche@....org>
To: Marco Elver <elver@...gle.com>
Cc: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@...radead.org>, Boqun Feng <boqun.feng@...il.com>,
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Subject: Re: [PATCH v5 02/36] compiler-context-analysis: Add infrastructure
 for Context Analysis with Clang

On 12/19/25 10:59 AM, Marco Elver wrote:
> On Fri, 19 Dec 2025 at 19:39, 'Bart Van Assche' via kasan-dev
> <kasan-dev@...glegroups.com> wrote:
>> I'm concerned that the context_lock_struct() macro will make code harder
>> to read. Anyone who encounters the context_lock_struct() macro will have
>> to look up its definition to learn what it does. I propose to split this
>> macro into two macros:
>> * One macro that expands into "__ctx_lock_type(name)".
>> * A second macro that expands into the rest of the above macro.
>>
>> In other words, instead of having to write
>> context_lock_struct(struct_name, { ... }); developers will have to write
>>
>> struct context_lock_type struct_name {
>>       ...;
>> };
>> context_struct_helper_functions(struct_name);
> 
> This doesn't necessarily help with not having to look up its
> definition to learn what it does.
> 
> If this is the common pattern, it will blindly be repeated, and this
> adds 1 more line and makes this a bit more verbose. Maybe the helper
> functions aren't always needed, but I also think that context lock
> types should remain relatively few.  For all synchronization
> primitives that were enabled in this series, the helpers are required.
> 
> The current usage is simply:
> 
> context_lock_struct(name) {
>     ... struct goes here ...
> };  // note no awkward ) brace
> 
> I don't know which way the current kernel style is leaning towards,
> but if we take <linux/cleanup.h> as an example, a simple programming
> model / API is actually preferred.
Many kernel developers are used to look up the definition of a data
structure either by using ctags, etags or a similar tool or by using
grep and a pattern like "${struct_name} {\$". Breaking the tools kernel
developer use today to look up data structure definitions might cause
considerable frustration and hence shouldn't be done lightly.

Thanks,

Bart.