The pointer isn't guaranteed to point into `environ` directly. `getenv()` could copy the value to a thread-local, (dynamically-allocated?) buffer while holding the lock.
Edit: In hindsight, a dynamic buffer would require returning ENOMEM errors (which might lead to some unexpected failures), while a static buffer would limit the value length. I think you might be right about the API being broken.
You miss the point. If you have full control over when and how getenv is called, there's no issue to begin with. The problem is that you don't, as OP demonstrates. It's perfectly natural to call getaddrinfo in a loop.
We need a new API which is not broken like in NetBSD, and a multi-year migration of all core libraries to it. Well a pity it wasn't started years ago though, could've been 95% done by now.
I was suggesting that the buffer be invalidated by each subsequent call – like some other libc functions' internal buffers – although, as I noted in the edit this would need `getenv()` to be able to indicate errors (specifically ENOMEM). It currently cannot do this as currently described, because NULL is used to indicate an absent variable.
You could also require callers free the returned memory when they're done, but that would be another change of API.
The solution to all problems like this was decided years ago: _r
You provide the storage and free it
The problem is these non-direct uses. They each need to switch to •_r and manage the buffer, or offer _r versions themselves and sort of pass through the problem
Of course, *_r is a better option, but the existing API is used so pervasively that it needs to be made thread-safe to actually avoid thread-unsafe code in, e.g, libraries.
A number of libc functions return a pointer to an internal thread-local buffer, which is invalidated on subsequent calls. If the function copies the environment variable's value to such a buffer while holding the mutex controlling access to the global state, then the returned value is guaranteed to remain unaffected by other threads.
There are, however, other problems (discussed elsewhere in this thread) that complicate such an API in the context of getenv().
