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Alexander J. Semenuk 5d5e35fb9b fix: Windows toolchain compatibility (curl 8.21 re-vendor, endless reconfigure loop) (#4355)
## Problem

Windows builds break with a current local toolchain (Scoop LLVM 22.1.8,
CMake 4.4.0, VS 2026), in two independent ways:

1. The build stops at curl's deliberate guard: `#error "no non-blocking
method was found/used/set"` in `third-party/curl/lib/nonblock.c`.
2. From the second configure onward, `cmake --build` re-runs CMake in an
endless loop (observed 42 consecutive reconfigure cycles in a single
build). Likely the same mechanism behind the "endlessly building" VS
2026 note in `docs/setup/dev/vs.md`.

## Root cause

1. `third-party/curl/CMake/CurlTests.c` passes `int *` to
`ioctlsocket()`, whose third parameter is `u_long *`. Clang 22 promotes
`-Wincompatible-pointer-types` to a hard error in C, so the
`HAVE_IOCTLSOCKET_FIONBIO` try_compile silently fails and
`curl_config.h` never defines it. Upstream CI does not see this because
the windows-2022 runner image ships an older LLVM. GCC 14 promotes the
same warning to a hard error, which is very likely the `CurlTests.c.obj`
failure reported from MSYS2 in open-goal/jak-project#3551. Upstream curl
hit the identical problem with GCC 14 and fixed the probe in curl 8.8.0
(curl/curl#13578).
2. The root CMakeLists copies the build tree's `compile_commands.json`
into `<src>/build/` for clangd using `configure_file()`, which registers
its input as a configure dependency. CMake rewrites
`compile_commands.json` late in every generation, after
`CTestTestfile.cmake` and `cmake_install.cmake` (outputs of the same
Ninja regen rule), so once the dependency is registered the rule is
deterministically dirty and every `ninja` invocation re-runs CMake. A
pristine first configure is safe (the file does not exist yet, so the
`if(EXISTS ...)` guard skips the copy), which is why the loop looks
machine- or IDE-specific.

## Fix

1. Per review, re-vendor `third-party/curl` at the `curl-8_21_0` tag
(previously `curl-8_3_0`), which carries the upstream probe fix plus two
years of upstream development; `vendor.yaml` updated to match.
Adjustments the version jump forced:
- curl 8.15 removed the native macOS Secure Transport backend
(`CURL_USE_SECTRANSP`), so macOS now builds curl against OpenSSL like
Linux. The two macOS workflows install Homebrew `openssl@3` and export
`OPENSSL_ROOT_DIR` (keg-only), and the macOS setup docs gained the same
two lines.
- `CURL_BROTLI` / `CURL_ZSTD` switched to AUTO-detection in curl 8.10;
pinned OFF to keep the previous no-compression behavior and avoid
silently linking whatever the CI images happen to have.
- curl's new top-level `BUILD_EXAMPLES` cache option (default ON) leaked
into discord-rpc's identically named option and broke configure at a
nonexistent `examples/send-presence` directory; pinned OFF ahead of the
third-party subdirectories.

The diff is dominated by the mechanical tag-tree swap under
`third-party/curl` (linguist-vendored, collapsed in review). The
hand-written changes are `CMakeLists.txt`, the two macOS workflows,
`docs/setup/system/macos.md`, and `vendor.yaml`.
2. Swap `configure_file()` for `file(COPY ...)`: the same clangd copy
with no configure dependency registered. (`file(COPY_FILE ...
ONLY_IF_DIFFERENT)` would be cleaner still but requires CMake 3.21,
above the declared `cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 3.10)`.)

## Test plan

- [x] Fresh `cmake --preset Release-windows-clang` (LLVM 22, no cache
seeding) completes and logs `Enabled SSL backends: Schannel`; the
FIONBIO probe passes without the previous `#error`
- [x] Full Windows Release build from scratch in the branch worktree
(all 1422 targets)
- [x] goalc-test suite: 1509 passed, 0 failed
- [x] Second consecutive configure with `compile_commands.json` present:
the regen rule in `build.ninja` has no `compile_commands.json` input;
`<src>/build/compile_commands.json` is still refreshed for clangd
- [x] Repeated `ninja` invocations after a full build no longer re-run
CMake
- [x] macOS Intel and ARM CI green (first exercise of the OpenSSL
backend switch)

---

I work off a self-hosted forge, so this GitHub account is quiet; the
configure logs and ninja dirty-node traces from the investigation are
available if anyone wants the raw data.

(AI-assisted)
2026-07-27 19:19:18 -04:00

3.8 KiB
Vendored
Generated

c, SPDX-License-Identifier, Title, Section, Source, See-also, Protocol, Added-in
c SPDX-License-Identifier Title Section Source See-also Protocol Added-in
Copyright (C) Daniel Stenberg, <daniel@haxx.se>, et al. curl CURLOPT_WRITEFUNCTION 3 libcurl
CURLOPT_HEADERFUNCTION (3)
CURLOPT_READFUNCTION (3)
CURLOPT_WRITEDATA (3)
All
7.1

NAME

CURLOPT_WRITEFUNCTION - callback for writing received data

SYNOPSIS

#include <curl/curl.h>

size_t write_callback(char *ptr, size_t size, size_t nmemb, void *userdata);

CURLcode curl_easy_setopt(CURL *handle, CURLOPT_WRITEFUNCTION, write_callback);

DESCRIPTION

Pass a pointer to your callback function, which should match the prototype shown above.

This callback function gets called by libcurl as soon as there is data received that needs to be saved. For most transfers, this callback gets called many times and each invoke delivers another chunk of data. ptr points to the delivered data, and the size of that data is nmemb; size is always 1.

The data passed to this function is not null-terminated.

The callback function is passed as much data as possible in all invokes, but you must not make any assumptions. It may be one byte, it may be thousands. The maximum amount of body data that is passed to the write callback is defined in the curl.h header file: CURL_MAX_WRITE_SIZE (the usual default is 16K). If CURLOPT_HEADER(3) is enabled, which makes header data get passed to the write callback, you can get up to CURL_MAX_HTTP_HEADER bytes of header data passed into it. This usually means 100K.

The CURLOPT_WRITEFUNCTION(3) callback receives the final response payload. When CURLOPT_FOLLOWLOCATION(3) is enabled, libcurl automatically handles intermediate 3xx redirects, meaning their HTTP bodies are skipped and not passed to this callback.

This function may be called with zero bytes data if the transferred file is empty.

Set the userdata argument with the CURLOPT_WRITEDATA(3) option.

Your callback should return the number of bytes actually taken care of. If that amount differs from the amount passed to your callback function, it signals an error condition to the library. This causes the transfer to get aborted and the libcurl function used returns CURLE_WRITE_ERROR.

You can also abort the transfer by returning CURL_WRITEFUNC_ERROR (added in 7.87.0), which makes CURLE_WRITE_ERROR get returned.

If the callback function returns CURL_WRITEFUNC_PAUSE it pauses this transfer. See curl_easy_pause(3) for further details.

Set this option to NULL to get the internal default function used instead of your callback. The internal default function writes the data to the FILE * given with CURLOPT_WRITEDATA(3).

DEFAULT

fwrite(3)

%PROTOCOLS%

EXAMPLE

#include <stdlib.h> /* for realloc */
#include <string.h> /* for memcpy */

struct memory {
  char *response;
  size_t size;
};

static size_t cb(char *data, size_t size, size_t nmemb, void *clientp)
{
  size_t realsize = nmemb;
  struct memory *mem = (struct memory *)clientp;

  char *ptr = realloc(mem->response, mem->size + realsize + 1);
  if(!ptr)
    return 0;  /* out of memory */

  mem->response = ptr;
  memcpy(&(mem->response[mem->size]), data, realsize);
  mem->size += realsize;
  mem->response[mem->size] = 0;

  return realsize;
}

int main(void)
{
  struct memory chunk = { 0 };
  CURLcode result;
  CURL *curl = curl_easy_init();
  if(curl) {
    /* send all data to this function */
    curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_WRITEFUNCTION, cb);

    /* we pass our 'chunk' struct to the callback function */
    curl_easy_setopt(curl, CURLOPT_WRITEDATA, (void *)&chunk);

    /* send a request */
    result = curl_easy_perform(curl);

    /* remember to free the buffer */
    free(chunk.response);

    curl_easy_cleanup(curl);
  }
}

HISTORY

Support for the CURL_WRITEFUNC_PAUSE return code was added in version 7.18.0.

%AVAILABILITY%

RETURN VALUE

This returns CURLE_OK.