On 29 May 2009, at 01:44, ABorka wrote:
fillchar(tmp, sizeof(tmp), #0);
gives the Hint: Local variable "tmp" does not seem to be initialized
message upon compilation, which should not happen because it is
actually the initialization.
It is not possible to change this in the compiler. The reason is that
if we change the first parameter of fillchar from a "var" parameter
(as it is now) into an "out" parameter (so the hint would not be
shown), then the behaviour of the code changes.
This is due to the fact that if you pass a variable to an out
parameter and this variable is reference counted or contains reference
counted elements (in case of an array/record/object), then the
compiler has to insert finalization code at the caller side for this
variable before passing it in. The result is that if tmp is reference
counted but nevertheless somehow contained garbage, e.g. in a program
like this:
type
pr = ^tr;
tr = record
a: ansistring;
end;
var
p : pr;
begin
p:=myspecialgetmem(sizeof(tr));
fillchar(p^,sizeof(p^),0);
end;
then the program will try to finalize the garbage at run time and most
likely crash. This may seem far fetched, but this sort of stuff
happens in real code (I got crashes before I knew this and tried to
change the move() procedure in this way).
Keep in mind that hints are the lowest level of "programming help"
that the compiler has to offer, and it is generally impossible to make
your code hint free. They are only intended to help you if you really
are at wits end regarding what could be going wrong. Otherwise, it's
best to stick to warnings and notes.
Jonas
_______________________________________________
fpc-devel maillist - fpc-devel@lists.freepascal.org
http://lists.freepascal.org/mailman/listinfo/fpc-devel
