[Asterisk-Dev] Re: ast_localtime() weird interface.

[Luigi Rizzo]

On Wed, Oct 12, 2005 at 07:15:37AM +0000, Tony Mountifield wrote:
> In article <20051011233741.B19609 at xorpc.icir.org>,
> Luigi Rizzo <rizzo at icir.org> wrote:
> > hi,
> > i am trying to compile asterisk-current with -Werror to clean up
> > compile errors, and amomg other things i hit a number of inconsistencies
> > on the first argument of ast_localtime() (this on FreeBSD-6, but
> > the problem may exist elsewhere depending on how time_t is defined).
...
> > and i'd like to change it, so that it is much easier to deal with the
> > different definitions of time_t on the various platforms.
> 
> Since everyone who is familiar with the localtime functions would be
> used to the existing case, I think such a change would be less
> desirable.
> 
> What kind of problems are you encountering in dealing with the different
> definitions of time_t?

the problem is that depending on the platform, time_t is
some variant of integer types, and a zillion places in say.c
calls ast_localtime() using &foo.tv_sec as a first argument
where foo is of type struct timeval.

The two types happen to differ on FreeBSD-6, as may be the case on
many other OS where system headers try to adapt to 64-bit
values for some types but one reason or another struct timeval and
time_t are not in sync.

Now, if we pass the argument by value (which is all we need)
the compiler can do the required cast automatically.
There is no other safe workaround because if the types differ
even an explicit cast won't help.

I would be convinced by the localtime legacy case if ast_localtime()
were widely used - but it is not: there are only 7 instances of it
in the entire tree outside say.c, which uses it a million times
but just because that entire file is made of entire sections of
code cut&pasted a thousand times with 1-2 line changes each time.
 So say.c is not something that one can use as an example.

	cheers
	luigi

> Cheers
> Tony
> -- 
> Tony Mountifield
> Work: tony at softins.co.uk - http://www.softins.co.uk
> Play: tony at mountifield.org - http://tony.mountifield.org
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