[PATCH 0/2] Fix an error-handling path when locking refs

[PATCH 0/2] Fix an error-handling path when locking refs

[Michael Haggerty]

In [1], Peff described a bug that he found that could cause a
reference transaction to be partly carried-out and partly not, with a
successful return. The scenario that he discussed was the deletion of
one reference and creation of another, where the two references D/F
conflict with each other.

But in fact the problem is more general; it can happen whenever a
reference deletion within a transaction is processed successfully, and
then another reference update in the same transaction fails in
`lock_ref_for_update()`. In such a case the failed update and any
subsequent ones could be silently ignored.

There is a longer explanation in the second patch's commit message.

The tests that I added probe a bunch of D/F update scenarios, which I
think should be characteristic of the scenarios that would trigger
this bug. It would be nice to have tests that examine other types of
failures (e.g., wrong `old_oid` values).

Bit since the fix is obviously a strict improvement and can prevent
data loss, and since the release process is already pretty far along,
I wanted to send this out ASAP. We can follow it up later with
additional tests.

These patches apply to current master. They are also available from my
GitHub fork [2] as branch `ref-locking-fix`.

While looking at this code again, I realized that the new code
rewrites the `packed-refs` file more often than did the old code.
Specifically, after dc39e09942 (files_ref_store: use a transaction to
update packed refs, 2017-09-08), the `packed-refs` file is overwritten
for any transaction that includes a reference delete. Prior to that
commit, `packed-refs` was only overwritten if a deleted reference was
actually present in the existing `packed-refs` file. This is even the
case if there was previously no `packed-refs` file at all; now any
reference deletion causes an empty `packed-refs` file to be created.

I think this is a conscionable regression, since deleting references
that are purely loose is probably not all that common, and the old
code had to read the whole `packed-refs` file anyway. Nevertheless, it
is obviously something that I would like to fix (though maybe not for
2.15? I'm open to input about its urgency.)

[1] https://public-inbox.org/git/20171024082409.smwsd6pla64jjlua@sigill.intra.peff.net/
[2] https://github.com/mhagger/git

Michael Haggerty (2):
  t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts
  files_transaction_prepare(): fix handling of ref lock failure

 refs/files-backend.c         |   2 +-
 t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh | 146 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 2 files changed, 147 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)

-- 
2.14.1

[PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Michael Haggerty]

It is currently not allowed, in a single transaction, to add one
reference and delete another reference if the two reference names D/F
conflict with each other (e.g., like `refs/foo/bar` and `refs/foo`).
The reason is that the code would need to take locks

    $GIT_DIR/refs/foo.lock
    $GIT_DIR/refs/foo/bar.lock

But the latter lock couldn't coexist with the loose reference file

    $GIT_DIR/refs/foo

, because `$GIT_DIR/refs/foo` cannot be both a directory and a file at
the same time (hence the name "D/F conflict).

Add a bunch of tests that we cleanly reject such transactions.

In fact, many of the new tests currently fail. They will be fixed in
the next commit along with an explanation.

Reported-by: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Signed-off-by: Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu>
---
 t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh | 146 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 146 insertions(+)

diff --git a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
index 100d50e362..8b5e9a83c5 100755
--- a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
+++ b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
@@ -34,6 +34,86 @@ test_update_rejected () {
 
 Q="'"
 
+# Test adding and deleting D/F-conflicting references in a single
+# transaction.
+df_test() {
+	local prefix="$1"
+	shift
+	local pack=:
+	local symadd=false
+	local symdel=false
+	local add_del=false
+	local addref
+	local delref
+	while test $# -gt 0
+	do
+		case "$1" in
+		--pack)
+			pack="git pack-refs --all"
+			shift
+			;;
+		--sym-add)
+			# Perform the add via a symbolic reference
+			symadd=true
+			shift
+			;;
+		--sym-del)
+			# Perform the del via a symbolic reference
+			symdel=true
+			shift
+			;;
+		--del-add)
+			# Delete first reference then add second
+			add_del=false
+			delref="$prefix/r/$2"
+			addref="$prefix/r/$3"
+			shift 3
+			;;
+		--add-del)
+			# Add first reference then delete second
+			add_del=true
+			addref="$prefix/r/$2"
+			delref="$prefix/r/$3"
+			shift 3
+			;;
+		*)
+			echo 1>&2 "Extra args to df_test: $*"
+			return 1
+			;;
+		esac
+	done
+	git update-ref "$delref" $C &&
+	if $symadd
+	then
+		addname="$prefix/s/symadd" &&
+		git symbolic-ref "$addname" "$addref"
+	else
+		addname="$addref"
+	fi &&
+	if $symdel
+	then
+		delname="$prefix/s/symdel" &&
+		git symbolic-ref "$delname" "$delref"
+	else
+		delname="$delref"
+	fi &&
+	cat >expected-err <<-EOF &&
+	fatal: cannot lock ref $Q$addname$Q: $Q$delref$Q exists; cannot create $Q$addref$Q
+	EOF
+	$pack &&
+	if $add_del
+	then
+		printf "%s\n" "create $addname $D" "delete $delname"
+	else
+		printf "%s\n" "delete $delname" "create $addname $D"
+	fi >commands &&
+	test_must_fail git update-ref --stdin <commands 2>output.err &&
+	test_cmp expected-err output.err &&
+	printf "%s\n" "$C $delref" >expected-refs &&
+	git for-each-ref --format="%(objectname) %(refname)" $prefix/r >actual-refs &&
+	test_cmp expected-refs actual-refs
+}
+
 test_expect_success 'setup' '
 
 	git commit --allow-empty -m Initial &&
@@ -188,6 +268,72 @@ test_expect_success 'empty directory should not fool 1-arg delete' '
 	git update-ref --stdin
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add long + delete short' '
+	df_test refs/df-al-ds --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add short + delete long' '
+	df_test refs/df-as-dl --add-del foo foo/bar
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete long + add short' '
+	df_test refs/df-dl-as --del-add foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete short + add long' '
+	df_test refs/df-ds-al --del-add foo foo/bar
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add long + delete short packed' '
+	df_test refs/df-al-dsp --pack --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add short + delete long packed' '
+	df_test refs/df-as-dlp --pack --add-del foo foo/bar
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete long packed + add short' '
+	df_test refs/df-dlp-as --pack --del-add foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete short packed + add long' '
+	df_test refs/df-dsp-al --pack --del-add foo foo/bar
+'
+
+# Try some combinations involving symbolic refs...
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + delete short' '
+	df_test refs/df-ial-ds --sym-add --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + indirect delete short' '
+	df_test refs/df-ial-ids --sym-add --sym-del --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add short + indirect delete long' '
+	df_test refs/df-ias-idl --sym-add --sym-del --add-del foo foo/bar
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect delete long + indirect add short' '
+	df_test refs/df-idl-ias --sym-add --sym-del --del-add foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + delete short packed' '
+	df_test refs/df-ial-dsp --sym-add --pack --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + indirect delete short packed' '
+	df_test refs/df-ial-idsp --sym-add --sym-del --pack --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add long + indirect delete short packed' '
+	df_test refs/df-al-idsp --sym-del --pack --add-del foo/bar foo
+'
+
+test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect delete long packed + indirect add short' '
+	df_test refs/df-idlp-ias --sym-add --sym-del --pack --del-add foo/bar foo
+'
+
 # Test various errors when reading the old values of references...
 
 test_expect_success 'missing old value blocks update' '
-- 
2.14.1

[PATCH 2/2] files_transaction_prepare(): fix handling of ref lock failure

[Michael Haggerty]

Since dc39e09942 (files_ref_store: use a transaction to update packed
refs, 2017-09-08), failure to lock a reference has been handled
incorrectly by `files_transaction_prepare()`. If
`lock_ref_for_update()` fails in the lock-acquisition loop of that
function, it sets `ret` then breaks out of that loop. Prior to
dc39e09942, that was OK, because the only thing following the loop was
the cleanup code. But dc39e09942 added another blurb of code between
the loop and the cleanup. That blurb sometimes resets `ret` to zero,
making the cleanup code think that the locking was successful.

Specifically, whenever

* One or more reference deletions have been processed successfully in
  the lock-acquisition loop. (Processing the first such reference
  causes a packed-ref transaction to be initialized.)

* Then `lock_ref_for_update()` fails for a subsequent reference. Such
  a failure can happen for a number of reasons, such as the old SHA-1
  not being correct, lock contention, etc. This causes a `break` out
  of the lock-acquisition loop.

* The `packed-refs` lock is acquired successfully and
  `ref_transaction_prepare()` succeeds for the packed-ref transaction.
  This has the effect of resetting `ret` back to 0, and making the
  cleanup code think that lock acquisition was successful.

In that case, any reference updates that were processed prior to
breaking out of the loop would be carried out (loose and packed), but
the reference that couldn't be locked and any subsequent references
would silently be ignored.

This can easily cause data loss if, for example, the user was trying
to push a new name for an existing branch while deleting the old name.
After the push, the branch could be left unreachable, and could even
subsequently be garbage-collected.

This problem was noticed in the context of deleting one reference and
creating another in a single transaction, when the two references D/F
conflict with each other, like

    git update-ref --stdin <<EOF
    delete refs/foo
    create refs/foo/bar HEAD
    EOF

This triggers the above bug because the deletion is processed
successfully for `refs/foo`, then the D/F conflict causes
`lock_ref_for_update()` to fail when `refs/foo/bar` is processed. In
this case the transaction *should* fail, but instead it causes
`refs/foo` to be deleted without creating `refs/foo`. This could
easily result in data loss.

The fix is simple: instead of just breaking out of the loop, jump
directly to the cleanup code. This fixes some tests in t1404 that were
added in the previous commit.

Signed-off-by: Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu>
---
 refs/files-backend.c         |  2 +-
 t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh | 16 ++++++++--------
 2 files changed, 9 insertions(+), 9 deletions(-)

diff --git a/refs/files-backend.c b/refs/files-backend.c
index 014dabb0bf..8cc1e07fdb 100644
--- a/refs/files-backend.c
+++ b/refs/files-backend.c
@@ -2570,7 +2570,7 @@ static int files_transaction_prepare(struct ref_store *ref_store,
 		ret = lock_ref_for_update(refs, update, transaction,
 					  head_ref, &affected_refnames, err);
 		if (ret)
-			break;
+			goto cleanup;
 
 		if (update->flags & REF_DELETING &&
 		    !(update->flags & REF_LOG_ONLY) &&
diff --git a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
index 8b5e9a83c5..b7838967b8 100755
--- a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
+++ b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
@@ -276,11 +276,11 @@ test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add short + delete long' '
 	df_test refs/df-as-dl --add-del foo foo/bar
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete long + add short' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents delete long + add short' '
 	df_test refs/df-dl-as --del-add foo/bar foo
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete short + add long' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents delete short + add long' '
 	df_test refs/df-ds-al --del-add foo foo/bar
 '
 
@@ -292,17 +292,17 @@ test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add short + delete long packed' '
 	df_test refs/df-as-dlp --pack --add-del foo foo/bar
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete long packed + add short' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents delete long packed + add short' '
 	df_test refs/df-dlp-as --pack --del-add foo/bar foo
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents delete short packed + add long' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents delete short packed + add long' '
 	df_test refs/df-dsp-al --pack --del-add foo foo/bar
 '
 
 # Try some combinations involving symbolic refs...
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + delete short' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + delete short' '
 	df_test refs/df-ial-ds --sym-add --add-del foo/bar foo
 '
 
@@ -314,11 +314,11 @@ test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add short + indirect delete
 	df_test refs/df-ias-idl --sym-add --sym-del --add-del foo foo/bar
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect delete long + indirect add short' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect delete long + indirect add short' '
 	df_test refs/df-idl-ias --sym-add --sym-del --del-add foo/bar foo
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + delete short packed' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect add long + delete short packed' '
 	df_test refs/df-ial-dsp --sym-add --pack --add-del foo/bar foo
 '
 
@@ -330,7 +330,7 @@ test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents add long + indirect delete short pack
 	df_test refs/df-al-idsp --sym-del --pack --add-del foo/bar foo
 '
 
-test_expect_failure 'D/F conflict prevents indirect delete long packed + indirect add short' '
+test_expect_success 'D/F conflict prevents indirect delete long packed + indirect add short' '
 	df_test refs/df-idlp-ias --sym-add --sym-del --pack --del-add foo/bar foo
 '
 
-- 
2.14.1

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Eric Sunshine]

On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 11:16 AM, Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
> diff --git a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
> @@ -34,6 +34,86 @@ test_update_rejected () {
> +# Test adding and deleting D/F-conflicting references in a single
> +# transaction.
> +df_test() {
> +       local prefix="$1"
> +       shift
> +       local pack=:

Isn't "local" a Bash-ism we want to keep out of the test scripts?

> +       local symadd=false
> +       local symdel=false
> +       local add_del=false
> +       local addref
> +       local delref
> +       while test $# -gt 0
> +       do

Re: [PATCH 0/2] Fix an error-handling path when locking refs

[Jeff King]

On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 05:16:23PM +0200, Michael Haggerty wrote:

> But in fact the problem is more general; it can happen whenever a
> reference deletion within a transaction is processed successfully, and
> then another reference update in the same transaction fails in
> `lock_ref_for_update()`. In such a case the failed update and any
> subsequent ones could be silently ignored.

Thanks for digging this down to the root cause. It sounds like this
might not be all that hard to trigger for users of "push --atomic", then
(most of the rest of the code is saved by the fact that it still uses
one ref per transaction, which I think can't trigger this).

> There is a longer explanation in the second patch's commit message.
> 
> The tests that I added probe a bunch of D/F update scenarios, which I
> think should be characteristic of the scenarios that would trigger
> this bug. It would be nice to have tests that examine other types of
> failures (e.g., wrong `old_oid` values).

What you added makes sense to me for now. I do admit I was a little
surprised that we didn't have better test coverage for partial
transaction failures. I think in general our test suite is weak on
checking failures, and covering more cases (like old_oid) would be
welcome. Those will be valuable especially as we started playing with
more storage backends.

I also agree that those tests can come post-release.

> While looking at this code again, I realized that the new code
> rewrites the `packed-refs` file more often than did the old code.
> Specifically, after dc39e09942 (files_ref_store: use a transaction to
> update packed refs, 2017-09-08), the `packed-refs` file is overwritten
> for any transaction that includes a reference delete. Prior to that
> commit, `packed-refs` was only overwritten if a deleted reference was
> actually present in the existing `packed-refs` file. This is even the
> case if there was previously no `packed-refs` file at all; now any
> reference deletion causes an empty `packed-refs` file to be created.
> 
> I think this is a conscionable regression, since deleting references
> that are purely loose is probably not all that common, and the old
> code had to read the whole `packed-refs` file anyway. Nevertheless, it
> is obviously something that I would like to fix (though maybe not for
> 2.15? I'm open to input about its urgency.)

I agree it's not nearly as urgent as the fix you have here. It might
show up on a busy system as increased lock contention over packed-refs.
Or if you have really gigantic packed-refs files, a possible performance
regression. But as you say, it should be a pretty rare case.

So I'd be OK with leaving it to post-2.15. OTOH, I suspect it's a pretty
small patch. If you happen to produce it quickly, it might be worth
seeing before evaluating.

-Peff

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Jeff King]

On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 12:19:26PM -0400, Eric Sunshine wrote:

> On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 11:16 AM, Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
> > diff --git a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
> > @@ -34,6 +34,86 @@ test_update_rejected () {
> > +# Test adding and deleting D/F-conflicting references in a single
> > +# transaction.
> > +df_test() {
> > +       local prefix="$1"
> > +       shift
> > +       local pack=:
> 
> Isn't "local" a Bash-ism we want to keep out of the test scripts?

Yeah. It's supported by dash and many other shells, but we do try to
avoid it[1]. I think in this case we could just drop it (but keep
setting the "local foo" ones to empty with "foo=".

-Peff

[1] There's some more discussion in the thread at:

  https://public-inbox.org/git/20160601163747.GA10721@sigill.intra.peff.net/

Re: [PATCH 2/2] files_transaction_prepare(): fix handling of ref lock failure

[Jeff King]

On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 05:16:25PM +0200, Michael Haggerty wrote:

> The fix is simple: instead of just breaking out of the loop, jump
> directly to the cleanup code. This fixes some tests in t1404 that were
> added in the previous commit.

Nicely explained.

I think that fix makes sense, and matches how the rest of the function
behaved. The other option would be to switch the recently-added code to:

  if (!ret && packed_transaction)
     ...

but it seems like the "goto" means one less thing for new code to
remember if it gets added.

-Peff

Re: [PATCH 2/2] files_transaction_prepare(): fix handling of ref lock failure

[Junio C Hamano]

Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu> writes:

> ... But dc39e09942 added another blurb of code between
> the loop and the cleanup. That blurb sometimes resets `ret` to zero,
> making the cleanup code think that the locking was successful.
> ...
> The fix is simple: instead of just breaking out of the loop, jump
> directly to the cleanup code. This fixes some tests in t1404 that were
> added in the previous commit.

OK.  Now because we do not break and start packed_transaction but
instead jump over that if statement, we'll leave packed_transation
instance that we got from transaction_begin() that we called
add_update() on, but haven't called transaction_prepare() on
behind.  That instance is pointed by backend_data pointer which is
part of transaction, so presumably transaction_cleanup() called on
it in the section labelled "cleanup:" should take care of it?

Thanks for catching the issue and fixing it quickly.  Will queue.

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Michael Haggerty]

On 10/24/2017 09:46 PM, Jeff King wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 12:19:26PM -0400, Eric Sunshine wrote:
> 
>> On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 11:16 AM, Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
>>> diff --git a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
>>> @@ -34,6 +34,86 @@ test_update_rejected () {
>>> +# Test adding and deleting D/F-conflicting references in a single
>>> +# transaction.
>>> +df_test() {
>>> +       local prefix="$1"
>>> +       shift
>>> +       local pack=:
>>
>> Isn't "local" a Bash-ism we want to keep out of the test scripts?
> 
> Yeah. It's supported by dash and many other shells, but we do try to
> avoid it[1]. I think in this case we could just drop it (but keep
> setting the "local foo" ones to empty with "foo=".

I do wish that we could allow "local", as it avoids a lot of headaches
and potential breakage. According to [1],

> However, every single POSIX-compliant shell I've tested implements the
> 'local' keyword, which lets you declare variables that won't be
> returned from the current function. So nowadays you can safely count
> on it working.

He mentions that ksh93 doesn't support "local", but that it differs from
POSIX in many other ways, too.

Perhaps we could slip in a couple of "local" as a compatibility test to
see if anybody complains, like we did with a couple of C features recently.

But I agree that this bug fix is not the correct occasion to change
policy on something like this, so I'll reroll without "local".

Michael

[1] http://apenwarr.ca/log/?m=201102#28

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Michael Haggerty]

On 10/25/2017 10:03 AM, Michael Haggerty wrote:
> On 10/24/2017 09:46 PM, Jeff King wrote:
>> On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 12:19:26PM -0400, Eric Sunshine wrote:
>>
>>> On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 11:16 AM, Michael Haggerty <mhagger@alum.mit.edu> wrote:
>>>> diff --git a/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh b/t/t1404-update-ref-errors.sh
>>>> @@ -34,6 +34,86 @@ test_update_rejected () {
>>>> +# Test adding and deleting D/F-conflicting references in a single
>>>> +# transaction.
>>>> +df_test() {
>>>> +       local prefix="$1"
>>>> +       shift
>>>> +       local pack=:
>>>
>>> Isn't "local" a Bash-ism we want to keep out of the test scripts?
>>
>> Yeah. It's supported by dash and many other shells, but we do try to
>> avoid it[1]. I think in this case we could just drop it (but keep
>> setting the "local foo" ones to empty with "foo=".
> [...]
> 
> But I agree that this bug fix is not the correct occasion to change
> policy on something like this, so I'll reroll without "local".

Oh, I see Junio has already made this fix in the version that he picked
up, so I won't bother rerolling.

Michael

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Jeff King]

On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 10:03:09AM +0200, Michael Haggerty wrote:

> > Yeah. It's supported by dash and many other shells, but we do try to
> > avoid it[1]. I think in this case we could just drop it (but keep
> > setting the "local foo" ones to empty with "foo=".
> 
> I do wish that we could allow "local", as it avoids a lot of headaches
> and potential breakage. According to [1],

Agreed.

> > However, every single POSIX-compliant shell I've tested implements the
> > 'local' keyword, which lets you declare variables that won't be
> > returned from the current function. So nowadays you can safely count
> > on it working.
> 
> He mentions that ksh93 doesn't support "local", but that it differs from
> POSIX in many other ways, too.

Yes, the conclusion we came to in the thread I linked earlier is the
same: ksh is affected, but that shell is a problem for other reasons. I
don't know if anybody tested with "modern" ksh like mksh, though. Should
be easy enough:

  cat >foo.sh <<\EOF
  fun() {
    local x=3
    echo inside: $x
  }
  x=2
  fun
  echo after: $x
  EOF

  mksh foo.sh

which produces the expected:

  inside: 3
  after: 2

So that's good.

> Perhaps we could slip in a couple of "local" as a compatibility test to
> see if anybody complains, like we did with a couple of C features recently.

That sounds reasonable to me. But from the earlier conversation, beware
that:

  local x
  ...
  x=5

is not necessarily enough to notice the problem on broken shells (they
may complain that "local" is not a command, and quietly stomp on the
global). I think:

  local x=5

would be enough (though depend on how you use $x, the failure mode might
be pretty subtle). Or we could even add an explicit test in t0000 like
the example above.

> But I agree that this bug fix is not the correct occasion to change
> policy on something like this, so I'll reroll without "local".

Also agreed.

-Peff

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[brian m. carlson]

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On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 11:32:51PM -0700, Jeff King wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 10:03:09AM +0200, Michael Haggerty wrote:
> 
> > > Yeah. It's supported by dash and many other shells, but we do try to
> > > avoid it[1]. I think in this case we could just drop it (but keep
> > > setting the "local foo" ones to empty with "foo=".
> > 
> > I do wish that we could allow "local", as it avoids a lot of headaches
> > and potential breakage. According to [1],
> 
> Agreed.

This would be useful.  Debian requires that all implementations that
implement /bin/sh support local and a small number of other features.

There is discussion in the Austin Group issue tracker about adding this
feature to POSIX, but it's gotten bogged down over lexical versus
dynamic scoping.  Everyone agrees that it's a desirable feature, though.

> > He mentions that ksh93 doesn't support "local", but that it differs from
> > POSIX in many other ways, too.
> 
> Yes, the conclusion we came to in the thread I linked earlier is the
> same: ksh is affected, but that shell is a problem for other reasons. I
> don't know if anybody tested with "modern" ksh like mksh, though. Should
> be easy enough:

As far as I can tell, bash, dash, posh, mksh, pdksh, zsh, and busybox sh
all support local.  From my reading of the documentation, so does sh on
FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD.  Not all of these are good choices for a
POSIXy sh, though.

ksh93 will support local if you alias it to typeset, but only when
called from functions defined with "function", not normal shell-style
functions.  I have a gist[0] that does absurd things to work around
that, but I wouldn't recommend that for production use.

Solaris 11.1's man page doesn't document local in sh (which is a ksh88
variant) and ksh is ksh93, so it doesn't appear to support it.  Solaris
11.3 documents bash, so it's a non-issue there.

It's my understanding that using ksh as a POSIXy sh variant is very
common on proprietary Unices, so its lack of compatibility may be a
dealbreaker.  Then again, many of those systems may have bash installed.

> > Perhaps we could slip in a couple of "local" as a compatibility test to
> > see if anybody complains, like we did with a couple of C features recently.
> 
> That sounds reasonable to me. But from the earlier conversation, beware
> that:
> 
>   local x
>   ...
>   x=5
> 
> is not necessarily enough to notice the problem on broken shells (they
> may complain that "local" is not a command, and quietly stomp on the
> global). I think:
> 
>   local x=5
> 
> would be enough (though depend on how you use $x, the failure mode might
> be pretty subtle). Or we could even add an explicit test in t0000 like
> the example above.

I'd recommend an explicit test for this.  It's much easier to track down
that way than seeing other failure scenarios.  People will also usually
complain about failing tests.

[0] https://gist.github.com/bk2204/9dd24df0e4499a02a300578ebdca4728
-- 
brian m. carlson / brian with sandals: Houston, Texas, US
https://www.crustytoothpaste.net/~bmc | My opinion only
OpenPGP: https://keybase.io/bk2204

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Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[Junio C Hamano]

"brian m. carlson" <sandals@crustytoothpaste.net> writes:

> There is discussion in the Austin Group issue tracker about adding this
> feature to POSIX, but it's gotten bogged down over lexical versus
> dynamic scoping.  Everyone agrees that it's a desirable feature, though.
> ...

In short, unless you are a binary packager on a platform whose
native shell is ksh and who refuses to depend on tools that are not
default/native on the platform, you'd be OK?

> I'd recommend an explicit test for this.  It's much easier to track down
> that way than seeing other failure scenarios.  People will also usually
> complain about failing tests.

Hopefully.  

Starting from an explicit test, gradually using more "local" in
tests that cover more important parts of the system, and then start
using "local" as appropriate in the main tools would be a good way
forward.  

By that time, we might have a lot less scripted Porcelains, though
;-)

Re: [PATCH 1/2] t1404: add a bunch of tests of D/F conflicts

[brian m. carlson]

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On Sun, Oct 29, 2017 at 09:05:44AM +0900, Junio C Hamano wrote:
> In short, unless you are a binary packager on a platform whose
> native shell is ksh and who refuses to depend on tools that are not
> default/native on the platform, you'd be OK?

Yes.

> > I'd recommend an explicit test for this.  It's much easier to track down
> > that way than seeing other failure scenarios.  People will also usually
> > complain about failing tests.
> 
> Hopefully.
> 
> Starting from an explicit test, gradually using more "local" in
> tests that cover more important parts of the system, and then start
> using "local" as appropriate in the main tools would be a good way
> forward.

I completely agree.  I just wanted to ensure that if we failed, it was
at least obvious to packagers who ran the tests.  I'm not sure there's
anything we can do if people don't run them.

I do think people may run the tests more frequently than you think,
though.  I always do in my packaging at $DAYJOB, but any failures
(usually missing SANITY) tend to already be patched by the time I get
off work and write a patch.
-- 
brian m. carlson / brian with sandals: Houston, Texas, US
https://www.crustytoothpaste.net/~bmc | My opinion only
OpenPGP: https://keybase.io/bk2204

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