[TUHS] v7 K&R C

Rob Pike robpike at gmail.com
Sat Apr 25 12:54:27 AEST 2020


Another debate at the time was caused by a disagreement between pcc and cc
regarding enums: are they a type or just a way to declare constant? I
remember getting annoyed by pcc not letting me declare a constant with an
enum and use it as an int. I protested to scj and dmr and after some to-ing
and fro-ing Steve changed pcc to treat them as constants.

Not sure it was the right decision, but C desperately wanted a non-macro
way to define a constant. I'd probably argue the same way today. The real
lesson is how propinquity affects progress.

-rbo


On Sat, Apr 25, 2020 at 12:51 PM Rob Pike <robpike at gmail.com> wrote:

> The ability to call a function pointer fp with the syntax fp() rather than
> (*fp)() came rather late, I think at Bjarne's suggestion or example. Pretty
> sure it was not in v7 C, as you observe.
>
> Convenient though the shorthand may be, it always bothered me as
> inconsistent and misleading. (I am pretty sure I used it sometimes
> regardless.)
>
> -rob
>
>
> On Sat, Apr 25, 2020 at 12:48 PM Adam Thornton <athornton at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On Apr 24, 2020, at 7:37 PM, Charles Anthony <charles.unix.pro at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On Fri, Apr 24, 2020 at 7:00 PM Adam Thornton <athornton at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> This doesn’t like the function pointer.
>>>
>>
>>> $ cc -c choparg.c
>>> choparg.c:11: Call of non-function
>>>
>>> Perhaps:
>>
>>     (*fcn)(arg);
>>
>>
>> We have a winner!
>>
>> Also, Kartik, dunno where it is on the net, but if you install a v7
>> system, /usr/src/cmd/c
>>
>> Adam
>>
>>
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