STRONG.TYPE.EXTRACT
Assignment of strong type variable to different type variable
The STRONG.TYPE family of checkers detects situations in which programmer-enforced strong typing (type-defined abstract types) is broken or ignored, allowing the underlying ANSI type semantics to dominate.
The STRONG.TYPE.EXTRACT checker looks for an instance in which a strongly typed value is assigned to a different, not strongly typed variable in one of these ways:
- through an assignment operator
- in a return value
- through argument passing
- in initialization
Vulnerability and risk
A compiler following the ANSI standard won't report a warning for this sort of issue, as it checks only the underlying types, not the surface, or programmer-defined, types. As a result, it's possible that a logic error can occur.
Vulnerable code example
Copy
typedef int Count;
int main() {
Count a;
int b = a;
return 0;
}Klocwork flags line 5, indicating that a strongly typed variable is assigned to a different, not strongly typed variable.