Don’t use memset init your struct

Even in some open source project, we always see memset filled in the code, here I had like give the reason why we should not use memset if possible.

• memset was subject to give side-effect to your code. memset description In some projects, memset was used to flush the struct, like the example given here bind example given in die.net

  int main(int argc, char *argv[])
  {
      int sfd, cfd;
      struct sockaddr_un my_addr, peer_addr;
      ...
      memset(&my_addr, 0, sizeof(struct sockaddr_un));
                          /* Clear structure */
     ...
  }
  

  memset will flush with byte by byte in your raw memory. in such situations, only 0 or possible 0xFF was allowed, otherwise you will get some results more than what you expected. Some examples like this one: good example

• memset was not efficient than the other solution. memset will have one function call when use it. I will take this struct as example:

  Disassemble code on the x86-64 arch machine.

  how we handle this with more elegant manner? Use initlization!

  struct sockaddr_un myaddr = {};
  

  Have a look at the disassemble code:

  

  Oops, it just use less code to finish this flush operation!

  Don’t use memset anymore!