--json-pp allows writing to non-regular files

[armijnhemel]

Description

Related to #3588 and #3589

scancode allows writing to device files such as /dev/null without an error. While it is possible to write to device files (as it is basically a black hole) it is possibly not something that was intended. I would have at least expected a warning (I could imagine that sending output to /dev/null could be useful in some test circumstances but it is not normal use of scancode).

How To Reproduce

Write to /dev/null:

$ ./scancode -l scancode --json-pp /dev/null
Setup plugins...
Collect file inventory...
Scan files for: licenses with 1 process(es)...
[####################] 2                  
Scanning done.
Summary:        licenses with 1 process(es)
Errors count:   0
Scan Speed:     1.70 files/sec. 
Initial counts: 1 resource(s): 1 file(s) and 0 directorie(s) 
Final counts:   1 resource(s): 1 file(s) and 0 directorie(s) 
Timings:
  scan_start: 2023-11-17T140919.392112
  scan_end:   2023-11-17T140923.125503
  setup_scan:licenses: 3.14s
  setup: 3.14s
  scan: 0.59s
  total: 3.74s
Removing temporary files...done.

and to /dev/zero:

$ ./scancode -l scancode --json-pp /dev/zero
Setup plugins...
Collect file inventory...
Scan files for: licenses with 1 process(es)...
[####################] 2                  
Scanning done.
Summary:        licenses with 1 process(es)
Errors count:   0
Scan Speed:     1.89 files/sec. 
Initial counts: 1 resource(s): 1 file(s) and 0 directorie(s) 
Final counts:   1 resource(s): 1 file(s) and 0 directorie(s) 
Timings:
  scan_start: 2023-11-17T140929.777710
  scan_end:   2023-11-17T140933.459251
  setup_scan:licenses: 3.15s
  setup: 3.15s
  scan: 0.53s
  total: 3.68s
Removing temporary files...done.

System configuration

For bug reports, it really helps us to know:

• What OS are you running on? (Windows/MacOS/Linux)
• What version of scancode-toolkit was used to generate the scan file?
• What installation method was used to install/run scancode? (pip/source download/other)

[pombredanne]

Closed in favor of #3596

[armijnhemel]

This seems to have been fixed.