Static variables

[Maxime Villard]

Hi,
is it normal that in some functions like

tc_ticktock(void)
{
static int count;

if (++count < tc_tick)
return;
count = 0;
tc_windup();
}

the static variables are not initialized?

- kern_tc.c l.547
- kern_resource.c l.499
- kern_sched.c l.106
- subr_extent.c l.130
- ...

[Franco Fichtner]

Hi Maxime,

On Jul 8, 2013, at 10:40 AM, Maxime Villard <rust...@gmx.fr> wrote:

> the static variables are not initialized?

Static variables are always zeroed when not specified otherwise.


Regards,
Franco

[Maxime Villard]

Ah, yes. I didn't know.

[Matthew Dempsky]

On Mon, Jul 8, 2013 at 2:06 AM, Maxime Villard <rust...@gmx.fr> wrote:
> Ah, yes. I didn't know.

For what it's worth, this is specified in C99 §6.7.8 (Initializaton)
paragraph 10:

"If an object that has static storage duration is not initialized
explicitly, then:
— if it has pointer type, it is initialized to a null pointer;
— if it has arithmetic type, it is initialized to (positive or unsigned) zero;
— if it is an aggregate, every member is initialized (recursively)
according to these rules;
— if it is a union, the first named member is initialized (recursively)
according to these rules."

On OpenBSD (and most, if not all, ELF platforms), this is implemented
by assigning these objects into the .bss section, which is initialized
to all zero bytes at program startup, taking advantage of the fact
that all of our platforms represent null pointers and zero values as
sequences of zero bytes.