Re: [PATCH v4 3/3] unzstd: make helper symbols static

[Julien Grall <julien@xen.org>]

On 29/04/2021 14:26, Jan Beulich wrote:
> On 29.04.2021 13:27, Julien Grall wrote:
>> On 21/04/2021 11:22, Jan Beulich wrote:
>>> While for the original library's purposes these functions of course want
>>> to be externally exposed, we don't need this, and we also don't want
>>> this both to prevent unintended use and to keep the name space tidy.
>>> (When functions have no callers at all, wrap them with a suitable
>>> #ifdef.) This has the added benefit of reducing the resulting binary
>>> size - while this is all .init code, it's still desirable to not carry
>>> dead code.
>>
>> So I understand the desire to keep the code close to Linux and removing
>> the dead code. However I am still not convinced that the approach taken
>> is actually worth the amount of memory saved.
>>
>> How much memory are we talking about here?
> 
> There are no (runtime) memory savings, as is being said by the
> description. There are savings on the image and symbol table sizes
> (see below - .*.0/ holding files as produced without the patch
> applied, while .*.1/ holding output with it in place), the image
> size reduction part of which is - as also expressed by the
> description - a nice side effect, but not the main motivation for
> the change.

Thanks for the providing the information. I have misunderstood your 
original intention.

Reading them again, I have to admit this doesn't really change my view 
here. You are trading a smaller name space or prevent unintended use 
(not clear what would be wrong to call them) to code 
maintenability/readability.

At the same time, this is not a code I usually work on (even if I am 
meant to maintain it). I will leave another maintainer to make the 
decision here.

Cheers,

-- 
Julien Grall