Add documentation about #if, #ifdef, and #if 0

Signed-off-by: David A. Wheeler <dwheeler@dwheeler.com>
This commit is contained in:
David A. Wheeler 2017-09-24 22:50:10 -04:00
parent 9299168b47
commit 90269a2c75
1 changed files with 23 additions and 0 deletions

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@ -1155,6 +1155,29 @@ Such constructs are bad style, and will confuse many other tools too.
If you must analyze such files, rewrite those lines.
Thankfully, these are quite rare.
.PP
Flawfinder reports vulnerabilities regardless of the parameters of
"#if" or "#ifdef".
A construct "#if VALUE" will often have VALUE of 0 in some cases, and
non-zero in others.
Similarly, "#ifdef VALUE" will have VALUE defined in some cases, and
not defined in others.
Flawfinder reports in all cases, which
means that flawfinder has a chance of reporting vulnerabilities in
all alternatives.
This is not a bug, this is intended behavior.
.PP
Flawfinder will report hits even if they are between
a literal "#if 0" and "#endif".
It would be possible to change this particular situation, but directly
using "#if 0" to comment-out code (other than during debugging) is itself
that the removal is very temporary (in which case we should report it) or
an indicator of a problem with poor code practices.
If you want to permanently get rid of code, then
delete it instead of using "#if 0", since you can always see what it was
using your version control software.
If you don't use version control software, then that's the bug
you need to fix right now.
.PP
Some complex or unusual constructs can mislead flawfinder.
In particular, if a parameter begins with gettext(" and ends with ),
flawfinder will presume that the parameter of gettext is a constant.