[U-Boot] RFC: introduce malloc_cleared() ?

[Graeme Russ]

On Thursday, October 14, 2010, Reinhard Meyer <u-boot at emk-elektronik.de> wrote:
> Wolfgang Denk schrieb:
>> Dear Reinhard Meyer,
>>
>> In message <4CB6A110.6080101 at emk-elektronik.de> you wrote:
>>> instead of adding or having the sequence of
>>>
>>> malloc(), memset()
>>>
>>> in all places where a definitely sane initialized structure
>>> is required it would make more sense to introduce a single
>>> function doing both. (The standard "calloc()" does not suit well
>>> here.) Overall that should even slightly decrease code size.
>>
>> And why exactly does calloc() not fit?
>
> It has two parameters... Produces more code to always supply an
> extra "1"...
>
> I am game with using calloc(). That's all.
>
> But for malloc() in such driver init situations, another code saving
> function with error message would be more effective. I don't see any
> possible way of continuing u-boot when malloc() for a relatively small
> structure already fails, and a (apparently) needed driver cannot be
> initialized.

The failed malloc can cause the dailed driver to unload malloc'd
memory and print a warning to the console. User intervention (changing
environment variables to avoid the out-of-memory on reboot for
example) can still be possible even though the driver failed.

>
> I am not talking about malloc()'s for buffers or similar where continuing
> of u-boot might be possible.
>

Regards,

Graeme