Re: [U-Boot] Bombs away! Was: [PATCH 02/10] net: rtl8139: Add initialized eth_device structure

Dear Nobuhiro Iwamatsu,

In message AANLkTikEa5OLvCEmNSJZtoddBrMk50=Zr=nv0CyL5VDy@mail.gmail.com you wrote:

...

...

          dev = (struct eth_device *)malloc(sizeof *> dev);

•         memset(dev, 0, sizeof(*dev));
  
          sprintf (dev->name, "RTL8139#%d", card_numbe> r);
  

Apparently its quite common NOT to check malloc()'s possible NULL return value... At least most NET drivers don't seem to...

Oh, This is a stupid mistake.

I just want to point out that this was not your mistake!

The existing code did not check the return code either.

So actually you fixed a bug, while Reinhard noticed another, unrelated bug.

I think that a function such as kzalloc of the linux kernel is convenient.

Yes, but it needs careful consideration about how to handle malloc() errors. It may not always be appropriate to crash the whole system.

Best regards,

Wolfgang Denk