Subject: Re: bug#44724: Uninitialised variables in syntax.c cause trouble.

From: Alan Mackenzie <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 2020 16:30:32 +0000

Hello, Martin.

On Thu, Nov 19, 2020 at 09:25:50 +0100, martin rudalics wrote:
>  >> Just curious: Did current_buffer == find_start_buffer really succeed
>  >> in your scenario?

>  > Yes it did.  All four comparisons in that block of code succeeded,
>  > causing a spurious value to be returned by find_defun_start.

> Isn't the probability for such a thing to be caused by uninitialized
> variables lower than that of the Emacs tagging scheme to fail as a
> whole?

Yes.

>  > But now I think that that value was a previously valid one which just
>  > hadn't been updated on buffer changes.

>  > I don't think there's any cache invalidation code associated with this
>  > cache,

> MODIFF == find_start_modiff

Yes, thanks, I was wrong there.

>  > and I think that's why it gave an invalid result.

I've found out what my problem is.  find_defun_start, unless one takes
precautions against it, calls syntax-ppss, which in my situation was
uninitialised.  There is nothing in Emacs to cause the initialisation of
syntax-ppss when, say, the syntax-table is changed.  It all needs to be
done by hand.

I'll close this bug as not a bug.

Thanks for all the help!

> martin

-- 
Alan Mackenzie (Nuremberg, Germany).