system_path(): always return free'able memory to the caller

The function sometimes returns a newly allocated string and
sometimes returns a borrowed string, the latter of which the callers
must not free().  The existing callers all assume that the return
value belongs to the callee and most of them copy it with strdup()
when they want to keep it around.  They end up leaking the returned
copy when the callee returned a new string because they cannot tell
if they should free it.

Change the contract between the callers and system_path() to make
the returned string owned by the callers; they are responsible for
freeing it when done, but they do not have to make their own copy to
store it away.

Adjust the callers to make sure they do not leak the returned string
once they are done, but do not bother freeing it just before dying,
exiting or exec'ing other program to avoid unnecessary churn.

Reported-by: Alexander Kuleshov <kuleshovmail@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>

1 files changed, 1 insertions, 1 deletions

diff --git a/exec_cmd.h b/exec_cmd.h
index e4c9702f02..93b0c02529 100644
--- a/exec_cmd.h
+++ b/exec_cmd.h
@@ -9,6 +9,6 @@ extern const char **prepare_git_cmd(const char **argv);
 extern int execv_git_cmd(const char **argv); /* NULL terminated */
 LAST_ARG_MUST_BE_NULL
 extern int execl_git_cmd(const char *cmd, ...);
-extern const char *system_path(const char *path);
+extern char *system_path(const char *path);
 
 #endif /* GIT_EXEC_CMD_H */