Diego Novillo wrote:
On Saturday 12 November 2005 12:05, Per Bothner wrote:
A "function-never-returns-null" attribute doesn't seem like
the right mechanism. Instead, there should be a "never-null"
attribute on pointer types. A "function-never-returns-null" is
just a function whose return-type has the "never-null" attribute.
I disagree. We would have to prove that every possible instance of this
type is non-NULL.
I think you're missing the point. The proposal is for a "type variant"
- not that different from say "constant".
"non-null java.lang.String" is a different POINTER_TYPE object than
"[possibly-null] java.lang.String". If you dereference an expression
whose type is "non-null java.lang.String" then you know you don't need
an null pointer check. If you derefernce an expression of type
"[possibly-null] java.lang.String" then you do need the null pointer
check.
--
--Per Bothner
[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://per.bothner.com/
