Dave Bartolomeo 99d33f9623 C++: Remove unreachable IR ...

This change removes any IR instructions that can be statically proven unreachable. To detect unreachable IR, we first run a simple constant value analysis on the IR. Then, any `ConditionalBranch` with a constant condition has the appropriate edge marked as "infeasible". We define a class `ReachableBlock` as any `IRBlock` with a path from the entry block of the function. SSA construction has been modified to operate only on `ReachableBlock` and `ReachableInstruction`, which ensures that only reachable IR gets translated into SSA form. For any infeasible edge where its predecessor block is reachable, we replace the original target of the branch with an `Unreached` instruction, which lets us preserve the invariant that all `ConditionalBranch` instructions have both a true and a false edge, and allows guard inference to still work.

The changes to `SSAConstruction.qll` are not as scary as they look. They are almost entirely a mechanical replacement of `OldIR::IRBlock` with `OldBlock`, which is just an alias for `ReachableBlock`.

Note that the `constant_func.ql` test can determine that the two new test functions always return 0.

Removing unreachable code helps get rid of some common FPs in IR-based dataflow analysis, especially for constructs like `while(true)`.

2018-12-10 21:22:55 -08:00

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identical-files.json

C++: Remove unreachable IR

2018-12-10 21:22:55 -08:00