Your JoeDog uses gcc v4.8.2 on his snazzy System 76 laptop. By default, that version uses this flag: -Wunused-but-set-variable If you’d like to see a lot of compiler warnings, then I suggest you use it, too.

Inside fido’s src directory you can find GNUs regex. The file names were changed to ereg.c, ereg.h and  ereg2.h to avoid potential naming collisions. Well, sir, that .c file cries like a whiney two-year-old when it’s compiled with -Wunused-but-set-variable. Here’s what you’ll see in the console:

gcc -DHAVE_CONFIG_H -I. -I. -I../include -W -Wall -D_REENTRANT -D_POSIX_PTHREAD_SEMANTICS -g -O2 -c ereg.c
In file included from ereg.c:640:0:
ereg.c: In function ‘byte_re_match_2_internal’:
ereg.c:7145:27: warning: variable ‘sdummy’ set but not used [-Wunused-but-set-variable]
const CHAR_T *sdummy = NULL;
^
ereg.c:7144:22: warning: variable ‘pdummy’ set but not used [-Wunused-but-set-variable]
UCHAR_T *pdummy = NULL;

Let’s see the offending code, shall we?

UCHAR_T *pdummy = NULL;
const CHAR_T *sdummy = NULL;

POP_FAILURE_POINT (sdummy, pdummy, dummy_low_reg, dummy_high_reg, 
                   reg_dummy, reg_dummy, reg_info_dummy);

I don’t know about you, but Your JoeDog thinks those variables are pretty much used. POP_FAILURE_POINT is a macro but that shouldn’t matter. Since he doesn’t maintain this code, Your Nerdblogger decided to put a bandaid on the wound rather than stop its bleeding.

The Internets are loaded with bandaids! Here’s one from a discussion on this exact topic:

#define UNUSED(expr) do { (void)(expr); } while (0)

To silence that warning, pass the offending variables to the macro and “Presto!” no more bitching….

UNUSED(sdummy);
UNUSED(pdummy)