Re: [PATCH tip/core/rcu 11/11] jiffies: Avoid undefined behaviorfrom signed overflow

From: Josh Triplett
Date: Sat Aug 17 2013 - 23:24:09 EST


On Sat, Aug 17, 2013 at 06:37:56PM -0700, Paul E. McKenney wrote:
> From: "Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>
> According to the C standard 3.4.3p3, overflow of a signed integer results
> in undefined behavior. This commit therefore changes the definitions
> of time_after(), time_after_eq(), time_after64(), and time_after_eq64()
> to avoid this undefined behavior. The trick is that the subtraction
> is done using unsigned arithmetic, which according to 6.2.5p9 cannot
> overflow because it is defined as modulo arithmetic. This has the added
> (though admittedly quite small) benefit of shortening two lines of code
> by four characters each.
>
> Note that the C standard considers the cast from unsigned to
> signed to be implementation-defined, see 6.3.1.3p3. However, on a
> two-complement system, an implementation that defines anything other
> than a reinterpretation of the bits is free come to me, and I will be

s/free come/free to come/

> happy to act as a witness for its being committed to an insane asylum.

With the typo above fixed:
Reviewed-by: Josh Triplett <josh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
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