Question

Is it safe to use a break instruction for a while/for loop, which is inside a list_for_each_entry instruction (in the Linux kernel)?

By example:

list_for_each_entry(obj1, vars, list) {
    ...
    while(j < k)
    {
        ...
        if(k >= MAX_ITERATIONS) break; // break the while
        ...
    }
    ...
}

Will the while loop be broken as expected or will the list_for_each_entry be broken?

Answer 1

break always breaks out of only the innermost loop, so the outer loop is not affected. In fact, to break out of multiple levels of loops, you have to use goto.