From: Taylor Nelms <tknelms@google.com>
Date: Tue, 31 Mar 2026 18:15:09 +0000 (-0400)
Subject: checkpatch: exclude forward declarations of const structs
X-Git-Tag: v7.1-rc1~126^2~15
X-Git-Url: http://git.ipfire.org/gitweb.cgi?a=commitdiff_plain;h=f758440d3d82f2e1804d7df281a64d9ad88b7f52;p=thirdparty%2Fkernel%2Flinux.git

checkpatch: exclude forward declarations of const structs

Limit checkpatch warnings for normally-const structs by excluding patterns
consistent with forward declarations.

For example, the forward declaration `struct regmap_access_table;` in a
header file currently generates a warning recommending that it is
generally declared as const; however, this would apply a useless type
qualifier in the empty declaration `const struct regmap_access_table;`,
and subsequently generate compiler warnings.

Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20260331181509.1258693-1-tknelms@google.com
Signed-off-by: Taylor Nelms <tknelms@google.com>
Acked-by: Joe Perches <joe@perches.com>
Cc: Andy Whitcroft <apw@canonical.com>
Cc: Dwaipayan Ray <dwaipayanray1@gmail.com>
Cc: Lukas Bulwahn <lukas.bulwahn@gmail.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
---

diff --git a/scripts/checkpatch.pl b/scripts/checkpatch.pl
index 27a43a4d9c438..7e612d3e2c1a1 100755
--- a/scripts/checkpatch.pl
+++ b/scripts/checkpatch.pl
@@ -7512,10 +7512,10 @@ sub process {
 		}
 
 # check for various structs that are normally const (ops, kgdb, device_tree)
-# and avoid what seem like struct definitions 'struct foo {'
+# and avoid what seem like struct definitions 'struct foo {' or forward declarations 'struct foo;'
 		if (defined($const_structs) &&
 		    $line !~ /\bconst\b/ &&
-		    $line =~ /\bstruct\s+($const_structs)\b(?!\s*\{)/) {
+		    $line =~ /\bstruct\s+($const_structs)\b(?!\s*[\{;])/) {
 			WARN("CONST_STRUCT",
 			     "struct $1 should normally be const\n" . $herecurr);
 		}