Re: RFC: add a string-desc module

[Simon Josefsson via Gnulib discussion list <bug-gnulib@gnu.org>]

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Bruno Haible <bruno@clisp.org> writes:

>   struct
>   {
>     size_t nbytes;
>     char * data;
>   }
>
> I propose to add a module that adds such a type, together with elementary
> functions that work on them.

I think this is a useful contribution, however I see two deal-breakers
for having it in gnulib -- both related to use in libraries.  I think
string helpers types/functions like this is useful not only in
applications but also in libraries.  Thus:

 1) License - there really isn't much novelty here, how about making
 this public domain or LGPLv2+?

 2) Applicability to use in a library - using x*alloc and abort is
 frowned upon in libraries.  Libraries should return error codes on
 expected errors (and I argue memory allocation failure is an expected
 error), and not cause application exits.

What do you think?

One way to resolve 2) is to have two variants of this functionality: one
low-level variant that doesn't abort the application on errors, and one
high-level variant that behaves like your implementation.  The
high-level variant could depend on the low-level variant, but that's not
essential.

/Simon

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