Fix for three f77 I/O bugs

Daniel R. Levy levy at ttrdc.UUCP
Tue Feb 25 10:15:04 AEST 1986


Here are fixes for three apparently long-standing f77 I/O library problems
in SysV f77 (and I think in BSD 4.2 and earlier--can't speak for 4.3--
someone sent me mail indicating that at least one of these was fixed in
4.3):

Problem 1.

	Formatted floating-point input crashes (or indicates incorrect
	input if iostat= or err= is used) when it reads 'E-format'
	input data which uses an uppercase 'E'.  (Lowercase 'e' works
        just fine.)

	Repeat by:

	      program foo
	      real a
	      integer io
	      read (5,10,iostat=io)a
	10    format(e5.1)
	      write(6,*)a,io
	      stop
	      end

	$ foo
	1.2e4	<typed by user>
  	 1.200000000e+04 0	<output by program>
	$ foo
	1.2E4	<typed by user>
	  1.20000005 115	<output by program>
	<program will crash with core dump if iostat= is not indicated>

	Diagnosis and Fix:

	The input processing is failing to recognize 'E' (and 'D') as
	valid alternates to 'e' and 'd' in formatted input.  The fix:

	In /usr/src/lib/libI77/rdfmt.c, approximately line 145
	[function rd_F()] change

	if (*sp=='d' || *sp=='e') { sp++; } else nfrac-=scale;

	to

	if (*sp=='d' || *sp=='e' || *sp=='D' || *sp=='E' ) 
		{ sp++; } else nfrac-=scale;

Problems 2 and 3.

	Explicit error checking for formatted internal input is broken in
	two ways.  If an err= or iostat= clause is specified in the
	read statement, an error is indicated or a nonzero iostat variable
	returned if the data read was correct (consistent with the format
	statement used).  If the data read was incorrect, then the program
	will die with a core dump despite the explicit error checking
	which was indicated in the Fortran program.

	Repeat by:

	      program bar
	      integer i
	      character*2 cbuf
	10    format(a)
	20    format(i2)
	      read(5,10)cbuf
	      read(cbuf,20,iostat=io)i
	      write(6,*)i,io
	      stop
	      end

	$ bar
	12	<typed by user>
	 12 2	<output by program>
	<note: on a 3B2, the error code will return as a large negative number.
	This example was done on a 3B20.  I don't know about vaxen.>
	$ bar
	ab	<typed by user>
	fmt: read unexpected character
	apparent state: unit 5 named 
	last format: (i2)
	lately reading sequential formatted internal IO
	abort - core dumped	<output by program>

	Diagnoses and Fixes:

	In the first problem (error returned even though input was correct)
	a value is being returned to the Fortran program from a C function
	that does not bother to return a value (!).  The fix:

	In /usr/src/lib/libI77/iio.c, insert a 'return(0);' statement
	at the end of the function z_rnew() [approximately line 27].
	(It also would be a good idea to insert a similar statement at
	the end of the function z_wnew() [same file] but who checks for
	write errors in internal I/O?)

	For the second problem (error checking from Fortran program is
	ignored, program crashes anyhow), the external pointer 'elist'
	to the current error-status table is never updated from the
	Fortran program!  The result is either garbage or the table
	from a previous external read or write.  This table, which is
	passed by address from the Fortran program in routine s_rsfi(),
	is supposed to indicate, among other thing, whether the Fortran
	program is trapping errors for the I/O operation.  The fix:

	In /usr/src/lib/libI77/iio.c, approximately line 31, in the
	function s_rsfi(), the sequence

		if(n=c_si(a)) return(n);
		reading=1;

	should be changed to (one line added):

		if(n=c_si(a)) return(n);
		elist=(cilist *)a;
		reading=1;
-- 
 -------------------------------    Disclaimer:  The views contained herein are
|       dan levy | yvel nad      |  my own and are not at all those of my em-
|         an engihacker @        |  ployer or the administrator of any computer
| at&t computer systems division |  upon which I may hack.
|        skokie, illinois        |
 --------------------------------   Path: ..!{akgua,homxb,ihnp4,ltuxa,mvuxa,
						vax135}!ttrdc!levy



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