Re: lynx-dev GuestWorld Guestbook Crashes Lynx 2.8rev.3

[Klaus Weide]

Thanks for finding this obscure problem...

On Thu, 26 Aug 1999, Bob Pfeifer wrote:

> I'm having problems viewing a Guestworld guestbook using Lynx 2.8 rev.3.
> Clicking on the forms submit button for viewing the next 10 messages
> (or previous 10 messages or go to message number ___) crashes Lynx
> with either a signal 11 error followed by an abort or my a memory fault
> error.  It seems that this is caused by the large number of messages
> in the list (1437) since I do not get a crash on other message boards
> that only have a few hundred messages.

I could reproduce the crash with previous versions, but it does not happen
any more with 2.8.2 (or later development code).

Previous versions were allocating a buffer for form submission data based
on the lenth of the original value plus some margin that no sane form
would exceed... however, this isn't a sane form.  :)  Actually the size
would have been big enough if it weren't for all the commas, which
get URL-escaped before submitting.

2.8.2 already uses a different method for allocating and growing that
buffer as needed, so this kind of crash should not occur any more, even
with insane form fields.  (The relevant changes are related to 'query'
in function 'HText_SubmitForm' in GridText.c.)


    Klaus