From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 2026 15:59:11 GMT
Subject: Re: [PATCH v2 0/7] setup: enforce repo passed to `create_repository()` has no state
Message-ID: <xmqqtsn9mkog.fsf@gitster.g>
In-Reply-To: <arpiK4chGRDnHXrW@pks.im>

Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks.im> writes:

>> Oops. I meant s/free(3p)/free(3)/
>
> Ah. 3p is correct though and refers to the POSIX man pages.

If used in a context where you really care about posix specified
behaviour and are interferred by differences among generic C
library's free() implementations, free(3p) may be the right way to
spell it out concisely.

Everywhere else, like in this patch where you do not care about the
distinction, the extra 'p' is merely a noise, I would have to say.

If you are writing a wrapper that _depends_ on your platform free()
being strictly posix compliant, then you might write something like

        #ifdef WE_HAVE_POSIX_FREE
        #define safe_free(x) free(x)
        #else
        static void safe_free(void *x)
        {
                ...
        }
        #endif

and your commit log message may say "We use free(3p) where
available, but otherwise emulate it via platform free() with some
safety knob".