[PATCH v2 3/3] git, help: fix memory leaks in alias listing

From: Jonatan Holmgren <jonatan@jontes.page>
Date: Feb 26, 2026, 20:53 UTC
Message-ID: <20260226205339.1535482-4-jonatan@jontes.page>
In-Reply-To: <20260226205339.1535482-1-jonatan@jontes.page>

The list_aliases() function sets the util pointer of each list item to a heap-allocated copy of the alias command value. Two callers failed to free these util pointers:

 - list_cmds() in git.c collects a string list with STRING_LIST_INIT_DUP
   and clears it with string_list_clear(&list, 0), which frees the
   duplicated strings (strdup_strings=1) but not the util pointers.
   Pass free_util=1 to free them.

 - list_cmds_by_config() in help.c calls string_list_sort_u(list, 0) to
   deduplicate the list before processing completion.commands overrides.
   When duplicate entries are removed, the util pointer of each discarded
   item is leaked because free_util=0.  Pass free_util=1 to free them.

Reported-by: Jacob Keller <jacob.e.keller@intel.com>
Signed-off-by: Jonatan Holmgren <jonatan@jontes.page>
---
 git.c  | 2 +-
 help.c | 2 +-
 2 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/git.c b/git.c
index 744cb6527e..aeb099ab11 100644
--- a/git.c
+++ b/git.c
@@ -119,7 +119,7 @@ static int list_cmds(const char *spec)
 	}
 	for (size_t i = 0; i < list.nr; i++)
 		puts(list.items[i].string);
-	string_list_clear(&list, 0);
+	string_list_clear(&list, 1);
 	return 0;
 }
 
diff --git a/help.c b/help.c
index 95f576c5c8..3e59d07c37 100644
--- a/help.c
+++ b/help.c
@@ -422,7 +422,7 @@ void list_cmds_by_config(struct string_list *list)
 	if (repo_config_get_string_tmp(the_repository, "completion.commands", &cmd_list))
 		return;
 
-	string_list_sort_u(list, 0);
+	string_list_sort_u(list, 1);
 
 	while (*cmd_list) {
 		struct strbuf sb = STRBUF_INIT;

-- 
2.53.0