Re: Safe memory allocation functions

Robert Haas wrote:
> On Thu, Jan 15, 2015 at 10:57 AM, Alvaro Herrera
> <alvherre(at)2ndquadrant(dot)com> wrote:

> >> I do think that "safe" is the wrong suffix. Maybe palloc_soft_fail()
> >> or palloc_null() or palloc_no_oom() or palloc_unsafe().
> >
> > I liked palloc_noerror() better myself FWIW.
>
> I don't care for noerror() because it probably still will error in
> some circumstances; just not for OOM.

Yes, but that seems fine to me. We have other functions with "noerror"
flags, and they can still fail under some circumstances -- just not if
the error is the most commonly considered scenario in which they fail.
The first example I found is LookupAggNameTypeNames(); there are many
more. I don't think this causes any confusion in practice.

Another precendent we have is something like "missing_ok" as a flag name
in get_object_address() and other places; following that, we could have
this new function as "palloc_oom_ok" or something like that. But it
doesn't seem an improvement to me. (I'm pretty sure we all agree that
this must not be a flag to palloc but rather a new function.)

Of all the ones you proposed above, the one I like the most is
palloc_no_oom, but IMO palloc_noerror is still better.

--
Álvaro Herrera http://www.2ndQuadrant.com/
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