These functions are like [v]snprintf(3), but return -1 on truncation,
which makes it easier to test. In fact, the API of swprintf(3), which
was invented later than snprintf(3), and is the wide-character version
of it, is identical to this snprintf_().
snprintf(3) is iseful in two cases:
- We don't care if the output is truncated. snprintf(3) is fine for
those, and the return value can be ignored. But snprintf_() is also
fine for those.
- Truncation is bad. In that case, it's as bad as a hard error (-1)
from snprintf, so merging both problems into the same error code
makes it easier to handle errors. Return the length if no truncation
so that we can use it if necessary.
Not returning the whole length before truncation makes a better API,
which need not read the entire input, so it's less vulnerable to DoS
attacks when a malicious user controls the input.
Use these functions to implement SNPRINTF().
Cc: Samanta Navarro <ferivoz@riseup.net>
Signed-off-by: Alejandro Colomar <alx@kernel.org>
It wraps snprintf(3) so that it performs some steps that one might
forget, or might be prone to accidents:
- It calculates the size of the destination buffer, and makes sure it's
an array (otherwise, using sizeof(s) would be very bad).
- It calculates if there's truncation or an error, returning -1 if so.
BTW, this macro doesn't have any issues of double evaluation, because
sizeof() doesn't evaluate its argument (unless it's a VLA, but then the
static_assert(3) within NITEMS() makes sure VLAs are not allowed).
This macro is very similar to STRTCPY(), defined in
<lib/string/strtcpy.h>.
Signed-off-by: Alejandro Colomar <alx@kernel.org>
