Implicit string concatenation in a list¶
ID: py/implicit-string-concatenation-in-list
Kind: problem
Security severity:
Severity: warning
Precision: high
Tags:
- quality
- maintainability
- readability
- external/cwe/cwe-665
Query suites:
- python-security-and-quality.qls
Click to see the query in the CodeQL repository
When two string literals abut each other the Python interpreter implicitly concatenates them into a single string. On occasion this can be useful, but is more commonly misleading or incorrect.
Recommendation¶
If the concatenation is deliberate, then use + to join the strings. This has no runtime overhead, and makes the intention clear.
Example¶
In the first function below, unclear, implicit string concatenation is used twice; once deliberately and once by accident. In the second function, clarified, the first concatenation is made explicit and the second is removed.
def unclear():
# Returns [ "first part of long string and the second part", "/usr/local/usr/bin" ]
return [
"first part of long string"
" and the second part",
"/usr/local"
"/usr/bin"
]
def clarified():
# Returns [ "first part of long string and the second part", "/usr/local", "/usr/bin" ]
return [
"first part of long string" +
" and the second part",
"/usr/local",
"/usr/bin"
]
References¶
Python language reference: String literal concatenation.
Common Weakness Enumeration: CWE-665.