[Bug libc/11312] New: popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[Bug libc/11312] New: popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[ebb9 at byu dot net]

For consistency with fopen and freopen, it would be nice if popen(cmd,"rb")
behaved like popen(cmd,"r") rather than failing with EINVAL.  In particular, the
extension of supporting 'b' in the mode argument is already provided by Cygwin
(although in cygwin, it actually makes a difference between text and binary
pipes).  POSIX does not forbid this extension.

The request to allow applications to blindly request binary mode, even though it
is otherwise a no-op in glibc, was first made here:
http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gnulib/2010-02/msg00195.html

Likewise, it would be nice if other fopen extension flags were gracefully
handled (silently ignore 'm', 'x', and honor 'c'), since 'e' is already a common
extension between both fopen and popen.  There is already precedence for this,
since fdopen silently ignores 'x'.

-- 
           Summary: popen should ignore 'b' in mode
           Product: glibc
           Version: 2.12
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: libc
        AssignedTo: drepper at redhat dot com
        ReportedBy: ebb9 at byu dot net
                CC: glibc-bugs at sources dot redhat dot com


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[xiyou dot wangcong at gmail dot com]

------- Additional Comments From xiyou dot wangcong at gmail dot com  2010-02-23 09:45 -------
(In reply to comment #0)
> For consistency with fopen and freopen, it would be nice if popen(cmd,"rb")
> behaved like popen(cmd,"r") rather than failing with EINVAL.  In particular, the
> extension of supporting 'b' in the mode argument is already provided by Cygwin
> (although in cygwin, it actually makes a difference between text and binary
> pipes).  POSIX does not forbid this extension.
> 
> The request to allow applications to blindly request binary mode, even though it
> is otherwise a no-op in glibc, was first made here:
> http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gnulib/2010-02/msg00195.html
> 
> Likewise, it would be nice if other fopen extension flags were gracefully
> handled (silently ignore 'm', 'x', and honor 'c'), since 'e' is already a common
> extension between both fopen and popen.  There is already precedence for this,
> since fdopen silently ignores 'x'.

It seems that ignoring 'b' makes sense.

Patch below does this.


-- 


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[xiyou dot wangcong at gmail dot com]

------- Additional Comments From xiyou dot wangcong at gmail dot com  2010-02-23 09:46 -------
Created an attachment (id=4620)
 --> (http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/attachment.cgi?id=4620&action=view)
proposed patch


-- 


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[bkorb at gnu dot org]

-- 
           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 CC|                            |bkorb at gnu dot org


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[drepper at redhat dot com]

------- Additional Comments From drepper at redhat dot com  2010-04-05 18:38 -------
Unnecessarily slowing down and enlarging well designed software for the purpose
of criplled OS and the lazy developers targeting them isn't acceptable.  For
decades people handled this correctly by passing different parameters on
different platforms.  Why can't you?

And don't argue "but it's not much".  This is how it always starts.  The next
time the argument (similar to what is done here already) is "since that change
went in you can also change this".

-- 
           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
             Status|NEW                         |RESOLVED
         Resolution|                            |WONTFIX


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[bkorb at gnu dot org]

------- Additional Comments From bkorb at gnu dot org  2010-04-05 21:05 -------
The "lazy programmers targeting them" is an unnecessary pajorative.
Sometimes, Ulrich, folks write software that other folks want to
port to "the crippled OS", that's why _I_ can't.  It's my software
and someone else is doing the porting.  And that is why the 'b'
character was added to the fopen() functions.

-- 


http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[eblake at redhat dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

Eric Blake <eblake at redhat dot com> changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 CC|                            |eblake at redhat dot com

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[Bug libc/11312] popen should ignore 'b' in mode

[fweimer at redhat dot com]

https://sourceware.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=11312

Florian Weimer <fweimer at redhat dot com> changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
              Flags|                            |security-

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