Right now, qmp-output-visitor happens to produce a QNull result
if nothing is actually visited between the creation of the visitor
and the request for the resulting QObject. A stronger protocol
would require that a QMP output visit MUST visit something. But
to still be able to produce a JSON 'null' output, we need a new
visitor function that states our intentions. Yes, we could say
that such a visit must go through visit_type_any(), but that
feels clunky.
So this patch introduces the new visit_type_null() interface and
its no-op interface in the dealloc visitor, and stubs in the
qmp visitors (the next patch will finish the implementation).
For the visitors that will not implement the callback, document
the situation. The code in qapi-visit-core unconditionally
dereferences the callback pointer, so that a segfault will inform
a developer if they need to implement the callback for their
choice of visitor.
Note that JSON has a primitive null type, with the single value
null; likewise with the QNull type for QObject; but for QAPI,
we just have the 'null' value without a null type. We may
eventually want to add more support in QAPI for null (most likely,
we'd use it via an alternate type that permits 'null' or an
object); but we'll create that usage when we need it.
Backports commit 3bc97fd5924561d92f32758c67eaffd2e4e25038 from qemu
The visitor interface for mapping between QObject/QemuOpts/string
and QAPI is scandalously under-documented, making changes to visitor
core, individual visitors, and users of visitors difficult to
coordinate. Among other questions: when is it safe to pass NULL,
vs. when a string must be provided; which visitors implement which
callbacks; the difference between concrete and virtual visits.
Correct this by retrofitting proper contracts, and document where some
of the interface warts remain (for example, we may want to modify
visit_end_* to require the same 'obj' as the visit_start counterpart,
so the dealloc visitor can be simplified). Later patches in this
series will tackle some, but not all, of these warts.
Add assertions to (partially) enforce the contract. Some of these
were only made possible by recent cleanup commits.
Backports commit adfb264c9ed04bfc694921b72173be8e29e90024 from qemu
