Drew T
3.1 KiB
§378b ★★★ — THE FOUR VARIANTS OF THE DECL BLOCKER, AND THE TWO PLACES §378 DOES NOT APPLY (P31 S69, all four measured the same day)
§378 gave the SELF-CALLER chain. Three more variants appeared within hours, and two of them break the chain rather than extend it. Identify the variant from the diagnostic before applying anything.
| # | diagnostic | who conflicts | fix | status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | conflicting types for func_X |
the TU's forward decl of the fn being DEFINED | fix_arity_callers --any-proto → cast_self_callers |
§378, byte-proven ×8 |
| 2 | conflicting types on a promotion-affected param (s16) |
same, but C89 forbids no-proto | cast_self_callers --sync-decls |
§378a, byte-proven main/func_80036D58 |
| 3 | conflicting types — RETURN type only, decl ALREADY () |
same, and the symbol is ADDRESS-TAKEN, not called | --sync-decls ALONE |
NEW, byte-proven ov_SC04_018/func_8017F35C |
| 4 | conflicting types for <SOME OTHER SYMBOL> |
a CALLEE the draft shares with the TU | NOT the §378 chain — see the refutation | DO NOT no-proto it blindly |
Variant 3 — the two levers that BOTH no-op. ov_SC04_018/func_8017F35C matched 0/47 and still
would not gate. The TU's decl at :5366 was extern void func_8017F35C(); — already no-proto, so
--any-proto has nothing to relax; and the use at :5385 is
func_801788B8((s32)a0, (s32)&func_8017F35C) — the symbol's ADDRESS is taken, so there is no call
site for cast_self_callers to cast. The only conflict is the RETURN type (void vs s32), and a
one-token decl sync fixes it. A decl sync is safe here precisely BECAUSE the site is address-taken:
there are no arguments to convert, so nothing can move.
Variant 4 — the refutation. I documented "run the same chain on the callee the diagnostic names"
and that is WRONG at scale. Applied to func_8012AD44 in ov_SC07_000, --any-proto no-protoed
60 caller decls and the binary went RED (265b24bb vs 9dbe4241), reverted via journal.
Why the self case is safe and the callee case is not: in the self case, step 2 CASTS the call
sites, so the decl change cannot alter argument conversion. For a callee, cast_self_callers
correctly REFUSES (it reads the return type off the draft, and the callee is not the draft), so the
decl change runs unprotected — and a no-proto decl applies the default promotions instead of
converting to the declared parameter types. With 60 call sites, some argument narrowing changed and
the codegen moved. It banked main/func_80021D38 earlier only because that callee had one decl,
not sixty.
The rule: never --any-proto a symbol whose call sites you are not also casting. Count the sites
first — fix_arity_callers prints the count — and if it is more than a couple, treat the callee as a
byte-risk edit that must be build-verified per binary BEFORE the gate, not after.
Standing order for any decl blocker: read the diagnostic, name the variant, and apply only that variant's lever. The chain is not a sequence to run blindly; it is a decision table.